ERNIE AND ERNESTINA: Searching

Book Two, Chapter 308: Thanksgiving Morning

It’s Thanksgiving morning.

Cloudless blue sky, temperature near forty. Many in my family will gather at my brother John’s house. His wife, Rhonda, will serve dinner at one.

Joshua calls. “So, do you want to go to your brother’s?”

“I don’t know. Do you?”

“I don’t like the food, and I just saw them eleven days ago.”

“Do you want to come here, look through the clothes you’ve left here? If you don’t want them, I’ll consign them or give them away.”

“Okay, I guess.”

“It’s not a fun thing to do, I realize, but I’ve gathered four or five bags for Goodwill. Tools, too. Perhaps you’ll look through the tools to see if you want any of them.”

“You’re right, I don’t want to look through clothes today. I’m going to start on a writing project. I’ll show it to you when I’m finished.”

“Not your daddy’s play?”

“I’m not telling you. I’ll show it to you when I’m finished.”

So often, words fail me when I talk to Joshua. I feel strangled. I say the most idiotic things. I talk about relationship addiction. I don’t even like the sound of my voice when I talk to him. I feel so clumsy with him.

Now he says: “You think I’m screwed up because of the way you and Daddy raised me. I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t want to talk about relationships. That’s all we talk about.”

We say good-by to each other, and I head to the park, but I feel an ache in my heart. Heartache. Joshua and I are only a few miles apart from each other geographically, yet miles apart psychically. I’m sure he feels the distance, too. He feels a need to put distance between us.

I go back to my place. As I climb the stairs, passing from one floor to the next, I smell cloves . . . then onion.

I guess neither Joshua nor I will be celebrating Thanksgiving . . . at least, not in a traditional way. Not with family.