homebody: incurable

When I was in second grade, Martha McNutt invited me to spend the night. It was to be my first sleepover flying solo. Though Martha and her family were very welcoming, within the first few minutes of the visit I was sorry I had agreed to stay. I wanted to be home.

Martha and I played for awhile, and then I snuck away and climbed up a tree in her yard. I climbed trees a lot back then, and would go up as high as the tree could take me. This one must have been a decorative fruit tree of some kind, because I could only get about 4 or 5 feet off the ground. It's hard to hide in a tree that's eight feet tall. "I'm really sorry, Martha," I remember saying through tears when she found me. "I want to go home." Mom came to get me, and of course (being who she was) was totally non-judgmental about it. I imagine I fell asleep happily in my own bed, talking to Ellen, as we did every night.

That's the first time I can remember ducking out of something social. Since then, I've done it over and over again. I'm the first to leave a party, if I get roped into going to one. When I was Academic Dean at Walker's, I'd sometimes leave by the fire escape at the end of the day so that I didn't have to check out with everyone. I love that doing counseling allows me to invite people into my den, spend an hour talking deeply together, and then go back into my den by myself.

At the large parties Laura and I sometimes give (open houses for the Porter's faculty, where the numbers are such that I can disappear), I hang out in the kitchen, chatting with the food service staff or doing the dishes. Or I will just keep moving through the crowd, like I'm on a mission. In our house, you can keep walking in a large circle and really look like you're headed somewhere.

This weekend I was up in Vermont at the Stowe Weekend of Hope, an annual gathering for cancer survivors and their families. Here is the nametag, by the way -- which I "get," but still seems worth sharing for its unusual touch.

I had no idea that you were allowed to bring someone with you to the Weekend of Hope. There were 400 cancer survivors there, but 1200 attendees: most people had friends or family members with them.

All meals were on your own. The first evening as people scattered to various restaurants, I went through the crowd saying, in my friendliest voice: "Anyone else here alone? Anyone here who might want to go for sushi?" No takers. I thought that was pretty courageous of me -- but it didn't work.

I probably shouldn't have limited the invitation to sushi. I realize that narrowed the field. Still, I thought someone would either join me or would say, "Come with us!"

So I sat at a sushi bar and ate dinner alone in Stowe, Vermont. Throughout the dinner, I thought, "I recognize this."

Not being sure where I fit is a leit motif in my life. I have wondered if it even has roots in being biracial -- I don't feel white, and I don't feel Chinese. Whatever those mean. I don't feel straight, and I don't feel gay. Whatever those mean.

Being something Other is familiar and true for me, and I wouldn't trade it. But sometimes it has led me to hide in the trees. To slip between the cracks, or just to slip away.

I left the Weekend of Hope a day early, just like I left Martha McNutt's house early nearly 50 years ago. I wasn't getting what I had hoped to get out of the workshops. Plus, over and over again, people were saying things like this: "Imagine you are told you have a year to live -- what would you do?" Everyone's answer was: "Spend more time with my family. Be with the people I love. Tell them, show them I love them."

After a couple of workshops with this theme, I thought, "What the heck am I doing here talking about being with the people I love?"

I drove home yesterday and fell asleep in my own bed, talking to Laura. And I got to see my beloved sister on her birthday today. I am only sorry that I had to recreate my strange little leit motif once again and missed my beloved brother's 60th birthday on Friday (celebrated by all 3 of my beloved siblings) because I wanted to attend a weekend that was (lovingly!) designed to help cancer patients embrace hope and seize the day.

Duh-oy.