Goodbye Beantown

On September 8, 2003 I left home for the first time in my life to live in Baltimore, MD. One of the most crime-riddled, poverty-stricken, drug-filled cities in America. I lived there for one year serving as a volunteer teacher in an Eastern Baltimore borough.

One year later on September 21, 2004, I left Baltimore to live in Boston, MA. A decidedly safer city, but one that caused me just as many emotional disillusionments. I stayed there for nearly two years.

Today is August 18, 2006. I will leave Boston in 77 hours to return to Chicago, IL. and I have no idea when or if I will ever come back.

I will not return home the same person as I left nearly three years ago.
Not even close.

* * * * *

"It's a damn shame, kiddo."
This is what comes to mind as J.P. and I stare absently up the trunk of an ancient oak tree located in J.P.'s backyard. J.P. is the student with whom I have spent the past fourteen months everyday after school doing my best instill common daily life skills.
The ancient oak tree was located in his front yard.
Located in the ancient oak tree was a brand-new basketball that J.P. tossed in between two of it's branches. The ball is less than a week old.
I continue, "It seems like everything oughta have some sort of fanfare, huh? Whether it's beginning or ending, everything ought to get it's proper due. Like a graduation."
J.P. grows bored with staring up at the ball in the tree. He sidles several steps away from me and plops exhaustively onto the freshly mowed grass. J.P. sits on his legs as if in prayer and rests his head on his chest like it was too heavy to hold up any longer.
I look at him for a moment. I've seen him sit like this before; like a tired child. It's annoying, especially for a 21-year-old man who hasn't done nearly enough physical activity to warrant such apparent fatigue.
"Oh. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Sure.", is J.P.'s only reply to my thoughts.
I don't know what response I was expecting for him. A miracle perhaps. I've been his best friend for fourteen months. I've taught him everything I could think of about becoming more independent. I've applied endless hours toward making him into what society dictates is "a better person".
At the end of 'The Usual Suspects' Kevin Spacey reveals that he is much smarter and more able than everyone gave him credit for. It took him until the end of the film to reveal it, but the revelation came nevertheless.
I guess I hoped for J.P. to appear the same way near that oak tree today... our final day together.
Instead of any such recognition that I've influenced his life, he spreads his body lying on the grass in a loose fetal position. If I allowed him to, he would fall asleep like this until his mother came home.
If I wanted that basketball out of the tree, I was on my own.
I continue as if we were actually engaged in a back-and-forth conversation, "It just doesn't seem right. Before you ever really had a chance to take advantage of the ball... it's gone."
No answer.
"It'll come down eventually, huh?"
Without looking at me, or even sitting up slightly, he replies, "Oh sure. Sure."
I continue staring upward into this massive tree, trying to figure out how this weakling launched the ball so high. It doesn't matter. None of it much matters, because this is the last contact I will ever have with this person. There is no work left for me to accomplish now.
I have spent more hours with this autistic person than anyone else in the past year; it seems a conversation is the least that the two of us can share, here. Now, with the minutes dwindling.
"Seems like we ought to have some sort of commencement for your basketball, man. We just got it and it's gone. You and I didn't get much of a game going."
Nothing I've said has anything to do with a basketball, really. J.P. gets up and walks toward the door leading inside to the den. It's almost time for his favorite television show, Oprah. Another habit of his I couldn't break.
"The game's over. Just like that. Without warning."
J.P. is already halfway into the house and wouldn't be listening even if he could hear me.

One last look up in the tree before I leave it there for good. One last hope for the Hollywood surprise ending. One last conversation. One last blog for my old home.
One last time.