Member-only story
Reflections on Identity
It’s Time for Goodbye Again
Leaving kids at college, leaving marriages, losing spouses
I have a friend who drives in silence; she lives in a rural area, so she spends a lot of time in her car going from one destination to another. This astounds me: no radio, no podcasts, no audio books? I cannot fathom it. The discord in my head is so deafening that it feels essential to tune it out with someone else’s words. When I am in my car alone, when I walk around the city doing errands, when I unload the dishwasher or fold laundry, even as I wash up for bed, I listen, pausing only when the vibration of my electric toothbrush drowns out the words. It is difficult to do this when I am with other people, which sometimes makes me not want to be with other people.
Last night I arrived back in New York City from Los Angeles, where I spent almost two weeks visiting family and moving my son into his college dorm for his freshman year. Accompanying us was my ten year-old daughter and my almost-eighty year-old mother. Sometimes we were also with my brother, who lives there, and his girlfriend and their year-old baby.
We drove everywhere, as one does in LA, and I was almost never alone. We halfheartedly listened to the radio, lowering the volume to a dim hum when we couldn’t find a decent…
