September 1, 2011
quote out of context
Now my own son has turned 17, the same age as the eggshell boy was then. He was in the void of pre-birth when our friend made his lonely descent through the lift shaft. I have a memory of being with my son when he was four years old. It is winter. We have left the warmth of our house for the freezing night air. There are few lights in the village and the sky is full of stars. We’re hardly out of the front door when he starts coughing. Are you all right? I ask him. It’s okay, he says, I think I just swallowed some dark. I realise that he has the notion that darkness is a substance. It will make you choke if you swallow too much in one go. I could have put him straight with some prosaic account of the coughing reflex. But I didn’t. I stashed away the treasure of the image, and left him with the version of reality fashioned by his own infant brain.
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Yep. This was the one I started with, somewhat randomly, while on my way to meet Michael in his hometown. I was running late due to public transportation woes, uncomfortable with that fact, and absorbing myself in Paul Bloks instead.
Actually, I tweeted a line from later into the essay I was so moved by this one. I’m glad you found this too.