Maybe we have to become almost old and have grown children, as I have, to understand our own parents and, reflected in them, something more about ourselves. Now, suddenly, I seem to comprehend the abyss of solitude I would fall into if I could no longer telephone my mother and tell her that Michele and the children are fine and ate happily.

Teens are this grisly combination of suppressed rage, sexual confusion, vanity, and unrelenting incompetence, but there may be a redeeming sweetness there, somewhere, buried very deep. Just imagine Donald Trump but more agile. Or a turkey vulture. There is a constant war between needing affirmation and shunning affirmation.

You are paralyzed by joy—yes, of course—and something else. A peripheral pain. You fear that you were destined to mess this thing up, this mothering thing. That no matter how many books you read on conscious child-rearing or how diligently you practice mindfulness, you are bound to get lost in the woods of parenting, dragging your poor kid behind y

You’re a starcher, he said, skinny but strong. You can fight them off, the Kafkas. Hit them in the kishkas. And remember to read the nature poets—a pastoral a day keeps the doctor away. Don’t be so proud of your anxiety.