He entered his apartment and greeted his equally exhausted wife, Seren, holding their young child, who, having just benefited from a nap, was the only Blauer in a pleasant mood. Jerry kissed his tired wife on the forehead and leaned in to kiss the young Barrett as well.
“How was your day?” he asked Seren.
“Oh, the usual. Nothing to report.” She smiled. Seren had found a teaching position at a very nearby private college, shortly after the birth of their son. Entering at the bottom rung of the university teaching world, while far from glamorous, had afforded her the flexibility she needed to care for Barrett. It also gave her retrospective approval for seeking out a master’s degree in English. She enjoyed it enough and now saw teaching as a perfect way to spend her future. She dreamed of someday getting associate professor status. “Finals are coming up, and I’m getting a little swamped with emails from frightful students, but I suppose that’s to be expected. Anything exciting in your day?”
“Not really. Danny had some more bullshit conspiracy theories to tell me about, I got hounded by my boss about the quarterly reports, same old, same old. There was a cellist in the subway, though. He sounded great. It gave me a bit of a lift.”
“What was he playing?”
“Nothing I recognized. But it captured me. I almost missed my train because of it, if you can believe it.” He laughed quietly, nearly inaudible, to himself. “I really miss performing regularly. I was thinking I should call up some of the guys I’ve played with recently to get a part-time, recreational thing going.”
“Well you know I support you in your creative fantasies, but we’ll have to make it work around our schedules. I guess your mom could watch Barrett a little more each week.”
“I’ll try to make it work. I don’t want to put a greater burden on you, but I think it’s something I need. Today marked one year at the Department, and that reminded how much I really hate it there. I think I need something else to grasp on to before I lose it.”
“Like family?”
“Of course family is something that keeps me going day to day. That’s why I work at the Department.” He refrained from calling his place of work “shithole” in the presence of family.
“But I honestly believe that in order to be a good father to Barrett, I need that release that I only get from music. I think you should get back into your writing as well. When was the last time you wrote a poem? A story? I think we have to show little Barry there’s more to life than nine-to-five. We can’t forget our passions when it becomes inconveni—”
“Alright, Jerry, don’t get melodramatic. We’ll make it work. I want you to be happy. And for your information, I wrote a poem for Barrett this afternoon.” She boasted with a wide smile.“Well that’s great. I think we should call him Barry while he’s young. Barrett is still a little stodgy for a baby.”
“Barrett was your idea. And I don’t stodgy means what you think it does.”
“Well let’s call him Barry till he’s at least like ten. Then he can be Barrett. Now tell me about the poem. And I think stodgy was the right word.”
“Who’s the English teacher?” Jerry’s rolling eyes signaled his defeat. “Right.” The broad smile returned.
“The poem?”
“Ah yes, I’ll show it to you after dinner. Your mom made shepherd’s pie. It’s reheating in the oven.”
“I love when my mom pretends she’s Irish for a day.”
After dinner and after the baby had been put to sleep, our sensual protagonist and his beautiful wife made love, and he wasn’t thinking of the new secretary with the low-cut blouse.
At 3:30 AM, Jerry woke up to the sound of Barrett’s piercing screams. He picked up his sleepless son, attempting to calm him, and sang softly into his little ear. He sang a melody, whose words Jerry had forgotten; yet this song is what his mother sang to him every night when he was very young. Had he remembered the words, he would have sung this:
Was soll ich länger weilen,
Dass man mich trieb hinaus?
Lass ihre Hunde heulen
Vor ihres Herren Haus;
Die Liebe liebt das Wandern—
Gott hat sie so gemacht—
Von einem zu dem andern.
Fein Liebchen, gute Nacht.
Had he remembered the lyrics to the song he hummed and remembered what those words meant, he would have told the little Barry that he’ll never leave him. Good night doesn’t have to mean good bye.
By this point, even my distracted readers have noticed a penchant for inner dialogue and self-reflective babbling in our protagonist. While singing into his child’s ear, he succumbed to this exhausting tendency. No matter your cost, consequence and burden, he thought regarding the life he held in his arms, you certainly are a blessing. His thoughts continued on in this predictable and clichéd manner, so I will spare you the details. You’ve heard it so many times before from young parents, awed by their ability to create a living being and aware of their responsibility to care for it. But these weaving thoughts reminded him of something his wife had mentioned during dinner.
“I forgot to tell you before, I have some bad news,” he recalled Seren saying. “Tanya, one of the grad students in my department, had a miscarriage.”
Poor woman, he now thought to himself as he laid Barrett back in his crib and slipped back into his own delicate sleep.
Cheers,
Flying Dutchman.
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