Son 1 is growing up

Last weekend we had both boys home briefly.  Hogwarts had a four-day break, and Durmstrang ... well, they didn't exactly have a break at all but we checked out Son 2 for a day so he could be home with his brother when we told them we were divorcing.  More about that story in another installment.

But in the meantime, Son 1 told us he wants to spend all or most of next summer visiting an old friend from his grade school, who moved away some years ago but with whom he has kept in touch by Facebook.

Moved several states away.  Maybe a thousand miles or more.

She's a girl.  Let's call her Lilibet.

Back in grade school, Son 1 was really sweet on her.  He didn't show it overtly, but this was back when Boyfriend 4 was living with us and B4 snooped in Son 1's journal; he then brought back the news that Son 1 was really, deeply, intensely devoted to her.  Of course, that was years ago, right?

She hasn't asked her mother about this yet.  It's just an idea they both had while chatting.

No, it's not like they talk a lot.  Just casually on Facebook.  Besides, she dropped her phone in the toilet recently, so they have been really out of touch lately.  (Which means it's not just over Facebook, right? And it's often enough that the loss of a phone makes a big difference ... right?)

And why next summer?  Well, she's one year older than he is, so it's the last summer before she goes away to college.

So can I go?

I have to admit that I think slowly when I'm asked a question like this, so I probably said something like "Ummm, ... we'll think about it."  He asked Wife separately, and she tells me she said, "Well why don't you have Lilibet come here instead? Her father lives nearby and she only sees him once a year. So maybe she'd like the chance to see him too." [Her parents split in a really vicious divorce back when Son 1 knew her in grade school, before her mother moved away with the kids.]  I don't expect Son 1 to take up this offer, because neither boy ever wants to bring friends home.  Maybe it's because the place is so run down and decrepit, or maybe it's because Wife and I fight too much, or maybe it's because they find us embarrassing in other ways.  Or most likely all of the above.  Anyway, I'm sure Son 1 won't be asking Lilibet over here any year soon.

Then I forgot all about it until Wife reminded me a couple nights ago.  And then I really did begin thinking.  You're sixteen years old; by that time you will be nearly seventeen.  You want to spend the summer with an eighteen year-old girl to whom you were passionately attached as a child, and who has been living Somewhere Else now for nearly half your lifetime.  Her mother is a single parent, so I assume she'll spend a lot of time at work, out of the house.  And this upcoming summer is a "last chance" to spend this time with her because somehow everything will change when she goes away to college.  Have I got that right?

Isn't this more or less the same thing as asking, I'm head over heels in love with this girl so can we spend the summer fucking like bunnies?  Of course I haven't said any of this to him at all yet.  He's already back at school.  But it has been going through my mind.

I guess Son 1 is growing up.

And I think I am going to tell him No, he can't go.  But I am trying to figure out what else to say.  There are a lot of things going through my head, but I'm not sure how many of them are useful.

First, whether they are planning it this way or not -- and I'll assume that the idea has crossed their minds -- the situation plainly has sex written all over it.  Three months together, at that age, with that much emotional background and inconsistent supervision?  It's obvious.

What then?  Sex creates a bond, even if there was none before.  Son 1 already has an emotional history with this girl, at least on his side.  (I have no idea how she feels.)  So sex will cement it even further.  Is this a bad thing?  In Disney movies, maybe not -- it's what lets the Prince and Princess ride off at the end of the story and live happily ever after.  But they are teenagers.  Are they really ready for Happily Ever After at this point?

Not likely.  Lilibet will be on her way to college; Son 1 will be too, a year later.  The same college?  Yeah, right.  But what's the alternative?  Surely not marriage and children, not at that age.  In another century, they would have been plenty old enough.  But our society isn't set up to handle that well these days.

So spending the summer together means intense romance, sex, and then break-up and heartache.  Doesn't sound promising.  And God forbid she should get pregnant.  Any way you look at it the situation has peril on all sides.

Now that I am actually writing this, though, I find myself asking the question, What if he doesn't go?  Is that better?

To my knowledge, Son 1 has never had another girlfriend (though he has had friends who were girls).  Why not?  Maybe he has, and just hasn't said anything.  (Son 1 has a gift for privacy, though I shouldn't complain because so do I.)  Or maybe he hasn't had the right opportunity or met the right girl.  (He's still young.)  Or maybe there hasn't been room in his heart for someone else because he has been carrying a torch for Lilibet all these years ... a torch that may have started off as a little boy's passion but that has never had the chance to grow old or cold because she has been Somewhere Else all these years.  If he doesn't go, will he just keep his heart inaccessible, occupied by the idealized image of a perfect and inaccessible Lilibet?

I can't rule it out.  You may remember that I moved a lot as a kid.  And when I was Son 1's age, I didn't have a girlfriend either.  In reality that's because I was so cripplingly shy.  But I comforted myself with memories of the little girl next door back when I was in first grade.  Did she even remember who I was at that point?  Probably not -- why should she?  First grade was a long time ago.  But did I still remember her fondly, and cherish her memory far more sweetly than I would have if we had actually grown up together?  Oh yes.  Her name still makes my heart flutter, just a bit.  But I can't say I wish a similar destiny on Son 1.

Would it be so bad if he ended up with Lilibet, living Happliy Ever After?  There are the superficial answers that say, How can you know if you are right for each other without getting out and seeing other people?  I don't know how seriously to take those.

But I do worry that Lilibet may suffer from depression.  Back when she lived here, when Son 1 and she played together and we visited with her mother at school events, I remember exactly what she looked like.  She was a sweet girl, and pretty, but her affect was slow and her eyes never smiled.  Even when her mouth smiled, even when she laughed, even when she looked genuinely happy ... there was something in her eyes that said that at some deep not-even-conscious level it was all an act.  I don't know if it was something innate, or if it was brought on by her parents' divorce, or if ..., or if ....  But I'm sure I saw it.

In fact, I have to wonder if her depression is part of what made -- makes -- her so attractive to Son 1?  In his book Against Depression, Peter Kramer says that studies have shown men are more attracted to depressed women than to healthy women.  (All men? Some men? The men in at least one study? I don't remember. I read it a long time ago.)  Nobody knows why, although my private theory is that seeing depression in a woman makes men want to take care of her, in the same way that seeing a woman cry exerts an almost irresistible pressure on us to dry her tears at all costs.  Or maybe it's just me who feels that way.

But if Lilibet is truly depressed, then I have a whole raft of other concerns.  I want to tell Son 1, You can't make her better just by loving her.  If she has a cold dark hole pierced in the middle of her soul, you can't fill it from the outside no matter how much warmth and light and love you pour in.  You can help her, but not in a way that will let her graduate to being free from needing help.  You can brighten her afternoons -- or her nights -- but not her lifetime.  And you can encourage her to seek medical help, but even that is likely to be only a palliative.  If you sign up for this ride, you can't assume that it will ever get better -- not permanently, at any rate.  And as romantic as it sounds to say that love will see you through all the storms and trials of life, ... sometimes it won't.  Look before you leap.

Really.

Any suggestions how much of this I should really say?