Sleep Well

Before he became a father, he imagined the relationship as being like an intensive version of owning a pet. The child, he thought, was essentially passive, a vessel into which you poured your love. On TV that's how it looked. Children were silent, dormant; you went into their bedrooms, gazed down at them fondly, drew the blankets over them as they slept. 

--The Bee Sting, Paul Murray

That's not only how it looked on TV. For me. For me, that's how it was. My son, as a child, as a little boy, was everything I wanted him to be. And more. He could not have been more perfect, and no father and son can ever have been closer than we. 

That was a long time ago, when he was just a child. It was a very long time ago, and yet, at the time, it seemed like it would be that way forever. 

It was not what I expected, nor did I envision a silent, dormant creature, such as Murray describes. I envisioned nothing at all, for I had never been a father nor imagined being a father nor wanted to be a father. 

So what had been unknown and unwanted or at least unthought of became all that was known, all that was wanted, the center of thought, the birth of selfless love. 

Murray's story doesn't end at the quote above. Nor does mine. One night you draw the blankets over them, and then in the morning they are gone.