Voices

Last night I did dinner and a movie with my kid. Despite last week’s report card being abhorrent, he came home yesterday with a citizenship award. I nearly dropped his ripped, crammed three-ring binder on my foot.

As we sat there at the pizzeria pre movie, picking and eating the bubbles off our slices, we stared at each other as if mere strangers. Or perhaps people who’ve come to know each other so well there was nothing left to say. His preteen aloofness was hanging over the mozzarella and gnawing at my cheerful disposition. Still I didn’t push too hard.

Eventually the conversation went from me going on about something I can’t even remember now to him slowly opening up to me the way he did just months ago. He revealed to me why he has been acting out recently, why he can’t make decisions, why he’s afraid. I can’t break his trust so I won’t go into details. But let’s just say it had to do with voices.

The voices we hear in our heads can sound like our own. They are the yin and yang of our existence and decision-making. They can sound like our parent’s, sometimes full of praise, sometimes belittling. They can sound like a voice we wish we had but were not born with.

After dinner we sat in the back row of the movie theatre and watched Lego 3D. I pride myself on recognizing the voices of the characters in animated flicks. Morgan Freeman was one of them. But pretty much everyone can recognize his strong, smooth, calming timbre. One of my friends told me she falls asleep to Through the Wormhole, narrated by the soother himself.

We plowed halfway through a medium bag (cause it’s just a dollar more than the small!) of popcorn as we donned our plastic 3D glasses and laughed at the witty dialogue. I laugh out loud. My kid doesn’t like this. Anyway, it was a pleasant and much-needed Mom and son date night.

This morning I was reading one of my poems to myself. And of course that parental voice chimed in. “Did you really do all the editing you can to make sure this is finished?”

Then the yin interrupted. “Ah, but it is finished when it is finished.”

Yang added “The end is the resolution and the beginning the question.”

I pondered these suggestions. Then I decided to reread the poem again. But this time with the voice of Morgan Freeman resonating through my brain. And it. Sounded. Magnificent.