ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, September 30, 1996 TAG: 9609300105
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Monty S. Leitch
SOURCE: MONTY S. LEITCH
I SPENT the other weekend with my nephew, who wanted to know if, after our visit, I'd write about him for the paper.
"If you do something really, really cute," I told him.
Talk about pressure! (On both of us, actually.)
Ten-year-olds, who are nearly 11, have their charms, certainly. But the unwittingly comedic wizardry of toddlers is lost to them forever, while incisive wit lies, still dormant and unhoned, somewhere near that part of the brain that laughs at farts and fannies and slapstick.
He told me silly jokes. He asked me, after various antics, "Is that cute enough?" He talked. He talked. He talked. Homesick for his parents, he threw up in my car.
Is any of that cute enough? Alas.
What both of us forgot is this: that the subject lies in surprise. That what, after all, piques the interest and sticks in memory is unexpected sincerity; that substance resides in revelation glimpsed.
And so what I'll take away from our weekend together has nothing about it of forced, pre-adolescent cuteness; but is, instead, a moment of fresh and tender sweetness.
We were in the woods, working together to make another path. I have, already, one loop of path in the woods, and the children love it as I do. Whenever they come to visit, the first thing they want to do is walk in the woods. For quite a while, I've talked of making another path that we could use, too. Now, on this weekend, my nephew and I were finally getting it done: scouting the route together, working side by side to move away dead branches and trim out over-hanging limbs.
As we worked, we chatted. I pointed out galax, teaberry, mountain laurel, rhododendron. He told me a few more silly jokes. We discussed the way we should go. Usually, he saw the clearer path, and so we proceeded as he pointed.
And then, at one point, he said to me, "Would you like a little house in the woods for Christmas?"
"What?" I asked him. Surprised.
"A little house in the woods. Where you could come to take a nap. I could build it for you, for Christmas. Right over there would be a good place."
He pointed to a clearing in front of us and, as he spoke, I could actually envision the little house he offered.
"No problem at all," he said. "Just pour some footers and put up walls. You think 10' X 10' would be big enough?"
He was serious! He would build me a little house in the woods for Christmas. Where I could read or take a nap. Where I could listen to the birds.
With unerring, instinctive accuracy, he had pierced the heart of my deepest longing: my own little house in the woods. I wanted with all my heart to cry out, "Yes! Yes, please build me a little house in the woods for Christmas. I'll live there forever."
But jaded old aunts know more of the intricacies of life than do their tenderly generous nephews. And so I said, instead, "What I'd really like is for you to draw me some plans for that little house. And then maybe, someday, we can build it."
"That's a good idea," he said.
And after we finished our work in the woods, he set to work on my plans.
Of course, we'll never build a little house in the woods. Really, we can't. But, what matter? What are footers and boards, when the gift is, truly, the dream? I have his tender wish for me. Nothing more is required.
Monty S. Leitch is a Roanoke Times columnist.
LENGTH: Medium: 70 linesby CNB