So I got to pick up the boy from his friends tonight. "Where have you been? What have you been doing?" the boy asks as we get in the car. While the answer to this one was supposed to be the subject of a joint discussion involving his mother too, I can't lie to him. But I start by mumbling something about waiting until his mother is with us before I will tell him. Of course, that's him well interested in what I've been doing, so here goes ... "Well, son, I've been doing something which will mean a big change in our lives," I tell him.
Fuck it, you lot don't need to know every word that was spoken, so let's just say that I told him, in what I think was the nicest possible way, that his daddy will be leaving in the next couple of weeks and that what I was doing earlier was looking for my own place to live.
Right, for some kids, this would have come as a massive shock, but, for my boy, he's known that mum and dad haven't been a couple for many years - about 10, now that I come to think of it - so he pauses and smiles and tells me it's "cool." Then immediately asks when I'm leaving cos his mum has told him in the past that when I move out he'll get the big bedroom and have more space for him and his friends to hang out in. I'm starting to think that the wee shite can't wait until I leave - ha ha! I've then been asking him all evening if he is cool about it and all the signs are that he is. I had driven him round to see the place before getting home from his friends and he is well pleased that it is not far from the house at all and is very close to his school. And he's chuffed to know that there is a spare bedroom for him, and he's chuffed when I tell him that, of course, his friends can come round, and, of course his friends can stay over with him. I also tell him that I'll still be round to check on him after school, as I am now, and that I'll be round quite often.
As the boy's mum said a week or so ago, this is something which we should really have done years ago. But it's happening now and everything is cool, and we're not going to argue about it and the boy is fine about it and me and his mum will remain friends for the rest of our lives. And now people can stop remarking about how "weird" my domestic situation is.
But is it so "weird" to have wanted to stay in the house with your own son, to see him grow up and bond with him and to share that house with your former lover, someone who will always remain a great friend? My boy has never been confused about our domestic situation. He has always known that there would come a time when either mum or dad or both would find someone else to love and that, probably, dad would leave.
So, if all goes to plan and nobody else gets in the frame for the flat, I'll be outta here in the next week or so. And, in all probability, it will be the happiest parting of the ways that i've ever known!
I'll keep all my bloggy mates posted!
*Lift To Experience, from their amazingly brilliant 2001 debut The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads.
