it like I do, and they’ve always been there, even when I chose not to see them. Three minutes and four seconds.
I wonder if the darkness charges them… I still don’t understand how they work.
JULY 24. 2055
Lena,
I haven’t told him about you, about us, but I’m sure you’d get along well. He’s an old soul, someone who doesn’t seem to notice that he’s talking with an elderly person. Maybe it’s because of me, it must be odd having a geriatric for a father. I know there have been people who’ve had kids at my age now, but it always seemed wrong. I wanted to have children when I was young enough to give them everything they needed, not when I was worried I’d sign off at any moment.
The confidence he has, there’s no way it came from me. Not the way he can look someone in the eye and speak as though he knew exactly what they needed to hear-and he actually listens. Most people just listen for the person to stop talking so they can start up again. With him, I feel like he wants to know what I have to say, that he cares about what I’ve been through.
It’s like he’s the me I always wanted to be.
Sometimes I think he’s parenting me. He’s the mature one, the stable one, the one with the life experience. I’m the one who’s barely left his home except to feel the darkness. And he understands that too, that’s why he’s here, ready to see his first eclipse.
I can feel the anticipation building in him, and I know he’s hoping that he’ll feel the same way I do, just so he can understand it even more.
I had never been so scared as when he first knocked on the door. I spent days and days thinking it was all a cruel joke, that I’d been given a son at the end of my life. Now I realize the blessing that he is-he’s humanizing me, changing me into the man I always could have been.
Bringing him here, it’s the least I could do. Three minutes, fifteen and a half seconds. Not bad for a first eclipse.
MAY 11, 2059
Dear Lena,
He’s with me again, helping me along. It’s getting harder and harder to make these trips and I’m sure you understand. The flights and all the traveling wears on me and I don’t know if it’s the pressure changes but my joints aches for days after I get home.
But it’s all worth it. To see you, to be in the darkness where everything is still right, it’s worth the pain and the hardships. And to have him with me, the darkness flowing between us—it’s more than I ever expected in life.
I’m sorry if I write less today, it’s just that I’m fixed on what’s here, not what could have been. I’m sorry, Lena. I still love you, but now with my son here and with the years streaming by, I find that I need to focus on myself and on him.
The fact that we only have a minute forty-two doesn’t help at all. I want to make sure I spend that time the best way I can. I can think of no better way than to spend it with my son beside me.
APRIL 30, 2060
Lena,
Back to Egypt once more. I find it interesting how we go to the same countries again and again when there are still so many we haven’t been to. We plan our trips to a place as close to the location of greatest eclipse as we can regardless of the country, but to think that we have never been to China or India—two large countries—is, well, odd. And now I find myself, as death creeps slowly up on me, wishing I had broadened my horizons, taken a path untraveled by the darkness and seen other parts of the world.
I’ve never been to the Caribbean, barely set foot in Europe, never been to Greece or Rome, and hardly seen any of the most amazing sights in the world. It’s sad to think of. There were places I was fascinated by as a child and so many of them I have yet to see. I checked the pyramids off my list when we went to Luxor, it was close enough that I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. Antarctica was another one, and I made that happen.
I guess I’m just looking back on my
I wonder if the darkness charges them… I still don’t understand how they work.
JULY 24. 2055
Lena,
I haven’t told him about you, about us, but I’m sure you’d get along well. He’s an old soul, someone who doesn’t seem to notice that he’s talking with an elderly person. Maybe it’s because of me, it must be odd having a geriatric for a father. I know there have been people who’ve had kids at my age now, but it always seemed wrong. I wanted to have children when I was young enough to give them everything they needed, not when I was worried I’d sign off at any moment.
The confidence he has, there’s no way it came from me. Not the way he can look someone in the eye and speak as though he knew exactly what they needed to hear-and he actually listens. Most people just listen for the person to stop talking so they can start up again. With him, I feel like he wants to know what I have to say, that he cares about what I’ve been through.
It’s like he’s the me I always wanted to be.
Sometimes I think he’s parenting me. He’s the mature one, the stable one, the one with the life experience. I’m the one who’s barely left his home except to feel the darkness. And he understands that too, that’s why he’s here, ready to see his first eclipse.
I can feel the anticipation building in him, and I know he’s hoping that he’ll feel the same way I do, just so he can understand it even more.
I had never been so scared as when he first knocked on the door. I spent days and days thinking it was all a cruel joke, that I’d been given a son at the end of my life. Now I realize the blessing that he is-he’s humanizing me, changing me into the man I always could have been.
Bringing him here, it’s the least I could do. Three minutes, fifteen and a half seconds. Not bad for a first eclipse.
MAY 11, 2059
Dear Lena,
He’s with me again, helping me along. It’s getting harder and harder to make these trips and I’m sure you understand. The flights and all the traveling wears on me and I don’t know if it’s the pressure changes but my joints aches for days after I get home.
But it’s all worth it. To see you, to be in the darkness where everything is still right, it’s worth the pain and the hardships. And to have him with me, the darkness flowing between us—it’s more than I ever expected in life.
I’m sorry if I write less today, it’s just that I’m fixed on what’s here, not what could have been. I’m sorry, Lena. I still love you, but now with my son here and with the years streaming by, I find that I need to focus on myself and on him.
The fact that we only have a minute forty-two doesn’t help at all. I want to make sure I spend that time the best way I can. I can think of no better way than to spend it with my son beside me.
APRIL 30, 2060
Lena,
Back to Egypt once more. I find it interesting how we go to the same countries again and again when there are still so many we haven’t been to. We plan our trips to a place as close to the location of greatest eclipse as we can regardless of the country, but to think that we have never been to China or India—two large countries—is, well, odd. And now I find myself, as death creeps slowly up on me, wishing I had broadened my horizons, taken a path untraveled by the darkness and seen other parts of the world.
I’ve never been to the Caribbean, barely set foot in Europe, never been to Greece or Rome, and hardly seen any of the most amazing sights in the world. It’s sad to think of. There were places I was fascinated by as a child and so many of them I have yet to see. I checked the pyramids off my list when we went to Luxor, it was close enough that I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. Antarctica was another one, and I made that happen.
I guess I’m just looking back on my
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