“According to my mother. In my opinion, I’m trying to keep my head from exploding.”
I struggled with Rule Two as well. While it was okay to encourage Frank to chew with his mouth closed and use a napkin, brushing away a bit of egg that dangled from his chin for most of a morning without asking was absolutely unacceptable. On his voyage to the floor and rigor mortis post-Egg Dangle Incident, Frank somehow managed to take me down as well.
At first I suspected he was the kind of demon spawn who’d take malicious pleasure in “accidentally” using me to cushion his fall. But to make amends for knocking me over, that night Frank surprised me with a juice glass filled with gardenias for my bedside table so, he explained, I could enjoy the smell of them last thing before I went to sleep and first thing when I woke up. I decided then that the kid was not so much evil as a clumsy, sweet-natured boy whose whole body seemed to be made of thumbs. More oblivious than obnoxious, a sleepwalker both night and day. I was convinced he meant well. Even after his acting out of the trajectory of fragrance to my pillow knocked the glass over moments after its delivery. I had to strip my bed pronto before the water soaked into the mattress.
By the time our first week was out, we’d established a routine. After breakfast I’d tidy up while Frank selected his wardrobe. You had to give him credit: He might not bathe or wash his face or brush his teeth without prompting, but Frank could put an outfit together. The high point of my day was seeing Frank emerge from the chrysalis of his closet to unfurl his sartorial wings.
The low point came hard on the heels of that, when I looked past him to the piles of rejected clothing shed on the floor. Getting him to return everything he’d nixed to a hook, hanger, or a drawer was usually a job of work.
“It’s not enough to dress like a gentleman,” I told him. “You need to act like one, too. Gentlemen do not disrespect their clothing by leaving it crumpled on the floor.”
“You can pick it up,” he said.
“Rule One says I can’t. You know that.”
“Then my mother can do it.”
“Your mother most certainly cannot do it. She’s working on her book.”
If he continued to balk, I’d pocket the remote to the house’s only television, saying, “No cinematic education for me today until those clothes are put away.” In the spirit of “ignorance is not bliss,” Frank had undertaken schooling me on film. Threatening to deny him the joy of lecturing me on his favorite topic worked every time.
Not that he didn’t protest. One day he’d be the untamed Helen Keller pre-Annie Sullivan in The Miracle Worker, dumping out drawers and kicking the contents around the closet, or tearing his hair and banging his head against the wall; the next, he was Boy Mahatma in Gandhi, lying stiff and motionless on the floor, the only thing folded up and put away being Frank’s connection to the outside world. If I ignored all that, sooner or later the kid caved. Once he’d taken care of the task at hand, though, he needed to spend some time wrapped in his comforter, rolling on the floor and muttering to himself before he could calm down enough for us to move on.
I tried to project the serenity my mother had when she’d dealt with my own bad behavior. But it was exhausting work. I lay awake at night, trying to come up with some developmentally appropriate Montessori way of inspiring Frank to discover the restraint buried somewhere deep inside him so I wouldn’t have to strong-arm him anymore. One night as I drifted off I had what seemed to me a brilliant idea. Frank was a devotee of film. We’d watch those two tales of the triumph of self-control, then discuss. He was an intelligent young man. He’d get the picture.
“I’ve got two of my favorite films for us to watch next,” I said, holding the DVDs of The Miracle Worker and Gandhi out for Frank to inspect as soon as they were delivered to our door.
“But I didn’t select them.”
“I know. I thought it could be my turn to pick.”
He looked dubious. “Is there dancing?”
Dancing in a movie about Helen Keller or even, let’s face it, Gandhi, seemed like the preamble for some particularly tasteless jokes. “I don’t remember,” I said. “Maybe not.”
“If you can’t remember, then they can’t be very good.”
“I’m not like you, Frank,” I said. “I forget stuff.”
I outlined plots. He listened solemnly, giving my eyebrow his full attention while I talked. When I was done he said, “No thank you please.”