The Goof is dealing with it

Nov 2010
The full-grown dorky dog who used to follow his mother around in the last lane, has changed suddenly into a sober fellow. His mother was a low-slung white creature I’ve seen for the last 12 years. Spunky, really her own person. The dorky son was one of the last of many of her litters over the years. He was a bit thick/daft, and kind of never left the nest. He hung around her even when fully grown. He had none of the charm and chutzpah of his mother. Bow legged, rat-tailed, gawky, the duffer would be hanging with that gormless look, somewhere around her, while she busily got food, staved off trespassing dogs, and did ten other bustly things that she had done all her life.
Some days back I saw him, not looking goofy anymore. And I knew at once, from his entire demeanour, that his mom had gone – she must have easily been 13 or 14 yrs old, his mom. It was her time to go. The Goof was now suddenly too aggressive, watching his back, running about guarding the lane ferociously, looking what could have been comical, but I didn’t feel like smiling. The Goof is, I think, experiencing the thing that happens when a parent goes. Suddenly, a layer is gone, between you and the hard sunlight, between you and the darkening sky, between you and the wolf at the door. You have to do it all yourself, now, and no amount of hanging around that efficient parent of yours has prepared you to do it on your own.
I must be looking a lot like Goof on some days, with my bustly old Dad gone – especially when I enter the bank, when I sit blank-minded across the table at the accountant’s, when I listen dully to the plumber telling me what needs to be done. And like Goof, I too either cave without a whimper, or take needlessly belligerent stances.
Our mums and dads have gone and we’re going to have to hack it alone. I’ve been married, independent, living away, and thought of myself as the one who’s looking after him for a while now, and not vice versa…same with my mum. And yet, when they’re gone, you’re out there, watching your back, tilting at windmills, perhaps making a silly goof of yourself as you guard your lane from god knows what.