It took me only two nights to start and finish David Sheff's Beautiful Boy. I cried most of the second, that being last night, and it is sticking with me. More than anything, for a mother of two delicious boys, it is a gut wrenching book not simply about crystal meth addiction, but rather the paralyzing fear that no matter what you do you cannot keep your babies safe.
Harrowing. Being a parent on a day to day basis is more about routine and consistency and then along comes a book like Beautiful Boy that reminds you that underneath nursery school, play dates and snuggling up for books before bed, is an electric current hum buzzing "all is not predictable." One week it is staples in the head to close a wound, next week Motrin for the fever ... but honestly, when they go off and are faced with choices whose consequences are literally life or death, as Sheff excruciatingly details, there is so little you can really do to predict the outcome.
Control is something that governs discrete portions of my life. High performing at work, relentlessly demanding the best for my kids, devouring research and news both personal and professional, yet struggling to get to the gym, enjoying too much cheese and wine and forever seeking balance. I know we have a predisposition for addiction somewhere swimming in the soup of our gene pool. The boys are still so young but I know I will look up from my routine life and they will be at risk, put there by the very nature I have worked so hard to create in them: curiosity, confidence and creativity ... and I will reflect on Sheff's experience, hopefully, and do what I can to safely scaffold my own Beautiful Boy(s) as they seek to explore and escape routines and predictability. Gulp.
