My wife took off her shoes first.
We had stopped at Menauhant Beach in Falmouth early on Sunday afternoon. It was October, and this was a detour, not a swimming expedition. Nevertheless, off came her shoes and socks, and into the ocean she went.
James saw his mother in the water and followed. Before long, I had abandoned my own shoes and socks and joined them.
The water was ice cold. Bracing, certainly. Invigorating, if you were feeling generous. It was also rather difficult to argue with the two people already enjoying it.
A little room
My first instinct was to follow James closely. Watch each step. Anticipate the next one. It is a familiar reflex when you have spent years attending to a child’s safety: you begin to move before you have quite decided whether you need to.
This time, I stopped myself.
I was still watching. But I hung back.
James has worked extraordinarily hard on his spatial awareness and his understanding of physical safety. There are hours of effort behind the things I was watching him do: learning, repetition, trying again. I knew that work. I had been there for it.
Now I needed to make a little room for what it had made possible.
James needed the freedom to be a teenager.
He danced in the water. He ran from the incoming waves. His unmistakable sounds of delight carried across the beach. He was choosing when to approach, when to retreat, and when to do the whole thing again.
There was nothing for me to organize. He was thoroughly occupied with his own afternoon.
I found that more moving than I had expected. So much of being his father involves helping him find his way through the world. It is possible to become so accustomed to helping that you fail to notice the moment when your help can take a quieter form.
I could be there and let this belong to him.
And there was my wife
She had waded farther out, shielding her eyes from the afternoon sun and looking toward the horizon.
She looked absolutely beautiful.
I loved seeing her that way. She was enjoying the water, the sunlight, the simple pleasure of having followed an impulse. For a little while, she had something that belonged to her.
Family life, especially with a child who has significant support needs, asks a great deal of your attention. Schedules, concerns, the next thing that needs doing. Even on a good day, some part of you is usually looking ahead.
Here she was, looking out.
And here was James, dancing with the tide.
I stood back and watched the two people I love most in the world.
Before the shoes went back on
There was no ceremony to mark any of this. No carefully arranged activity, no formal acknowledgment of the work that had brought James to this particular stretch of water.
There was my son enjoying himself. There was my wife enjoying herself. And there was the unexpected pleasure of realizing that I could simply enjoy them.
Letting go, even a little, asks you to trust the work your child has done. It also asks you to recognize that the moment is his. James did not need me to give his afternoon a meaning. He already knew what he wanted to do with it.
My wife, meanwhile, had reminded me how much can begin with taking your shoes off.
Eventually, we would have to put them back on. The schedules and responsibilities would still be there.
But for a little while, on a beach in Falmouth, I watched my son move forward and my wife stand in the sun. I was glad I had joined them. I was glad, too, that I had known when to stand back.
Three pairs of bare feet. One ice-cold ocean. And a moment of freedom I won’t soon forget.
