To Eavesdropping

My parents had great parties. Mom would break out this wine decanter: a glass vase of sorts that was suspended above the table by an iron wire sculpture. To serve a drink, you had to press your glass against the spigot. I thought it the height of elegance.

"Bridge Over Troubled Water" by Source.
Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/File:Bridge_Over_Troubled_Water.jpg#/m
edia/File:Bridge_Over_Troubled_Water.jpg

People arrive in ones and twos, sometimes threes and soon the voices drown out the Simon and Garfunkel playing in the background. To me, it’s just a sea of tweed jackets and hip belts. Occasionally, someone speaks to me, but mostly, I’m ignored and I love it.

I hear Mom in the kitchen and step just inside the room. She’s got the blender out, ice cream and bottles of something making Velvet Hammers. She’s pouring these boozy milkshakes into wine glasses and serving it up to the grad students who have come to mingle with their professors. Clearly, I will go to graduate school some day.

But she sees me and shoos me off to bed. I fall asleep straining to hear them because this is how adults behave when children aren’t around; this is the secret kingdom of adulthood. I can’t make out any of it. But they laugh a lot. They tease each other. I thought all they did was work, but tonight they are playing.

Another evening, a small dinner party. Maybe just one other couple but the only person I remember was John Dutton. He was soft spoken and thin. I found adults either frightening or kind and John was kind. He asked me questions and better yet, he let me ask him questions. So far, I was not told to go to bed.

In the living room, I sit next to him and lean against him. He’s a dad so he gets it, rubs the top of my head and they keep talking. I’m riveted to their every word, though I have no idea what they are talking about. They mention names I’ve never heard; their voices rise and fall but there’s very little pause and I think they have forgotten about me. I could stay here all night and know, finally, what it is that adults care so much about, what they say when they are alone.

Dad calls out my name, but I pretend not to hear him. He says it’s time for bed. John says, “No, she’s ok. She’s just resting her eyes,” and he lets me stay next to him. Dad doesn’t argue, maybe because it’s John and he just has a way. They keep talking and I listen hard to their every word: a language I need to learn in an accent I think I will never master.