Anne Daly, a teacher at a high school in Yonkers, is glad when her son Corey comes home on an unexpected break from his assignment in El Salvador where he teaches poor children at a rural school. But she is upset by his announcement about what he plans to do with his life. She knows she should be happy about it because he will be doing something he loves, and because it’s aligned with her own values, but she has deep feelings against his plan because of what happened years ago to her only brother.
Excerpt
Anne hadn’t seen her son Corey for more than a year, so she was glad when he came home for a break from El Salvador where he was teaching poor children in a rural village. But her feeling changed when in the kitchen, where she had made coffee to help him recover from his long trip, he told her what he planned to do with his life. She wasn’t totally surprised because after completing his master’s degree in social work at Fordham University he had volunteered for a church-sponsored mission, pursuing his dream of helping people, but when he told her about his plan it felt like a spear thrust into her heart, and she cried out in anguish. Though she saw in his eyes that he was baffled by her reaction, all she could say was: “No, you can’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t want it.”
“Why don’t you want it?”
She knew he deserved an explanation, but at this moment she didn’t have the stomach to dig up what had been buried in the past. At some point she would have to tell him why she so strongly objected to his plan, but now was not the time, and she resorted to saying: “I just don’t want it.”
He set his mug of coffee down on the kitchen table and took a deep breath, raising his shoulders and lowering them with a sigh. “Well, I think I understand. But I was hoping you would understand.”
“I do understand, but you don’t understand. It’s not what you think.”
“Then what is it?” he asked, his voice rising.
“I can explain, but not now. I need time to process it. We can talk about it later this evening.” She reached out and put her hand on his solid shoulder. “So go and tell your father, okay?”“Okay.” Before he turned to go he gave her the look of a little boy who felt bad about upsetting his mother.
Not that he had ever done anything before that really upset her. He had always been so attuned to her feelings as well as to the feelings of other people, which made him effective not only in his work but also in his relationships. And she couldn’t blame him for not understanding her feelings now because she had never told him about what happened to her family before he was born. There had never been a reason to tell him.
