I turned around. Sam sat grimly in his seat and I fixed him with gimlet eyes, pinning him to the seat until he could see the errors of his ways.

It seems idiotic for Sam to challenge me so often, since he has no income to speak of, and he can't drive; but this is in his job description. I looked at the face in the altar, toothless and muckled, with a folded over mouth. In the alder branches above me, a little gray bird flitted about, modest but melodious. The leaves of the alder quivered. I started to miss Sam. He's every single good thing, including honest, and openly questioning and angry, which I love so much: The other day he said, with enormous hostility, "We are the only family I know that doesn't display its china." I pointed out nicely that we don't have any china, and he said, "That's my point."

The hills behind me were so close, palomino gold, curvy and feminine. The quaking leaves of the alder sounded like rain against a skylight.

I looked over at my bad boy. He was staring out the window with resigned misery, as if he were going to the dentist. I thought about stoning him. Jesus would have said, "Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, and Tax Collectors, and Thirteen-Year-Olds," which means, "You are totally pissing me off." And he'd have said this right before he got a rock.

I bet he had a good arm, being a carpenter and all. I bet he could take a kid out at 150 yards. I thought of Sam's most infuriating habits -- how snotty he can act, how entitled -- his clothes and towels always dropped on the floor, the way he answers the phone; he sounds like Henry Kissinger.

What a mess we are, I thought. But this is usually where any hope of improvement begins, acknowledging the mess. When I am well, I know not to mess with mess right away; if there is a knot, you don't start randomly tugging at loose threads. You try to let silence and time help untangle the knot. There's space between each section of the tangle, although it doesn't feel like there is. You can't untangle it through grinding your teeth and heavy breathing. You fiddle in the mildest way you can, and find out what the movable strand is -- and that, in this case, was me.

I decided to move out from under the weight of his gaze and discomfort, and so I lay down beside the log. There were some tiny antic wildflowers in the grass beside me. I closed my eyes and listened to the little birds, to the alders and the grass. I smelled the hay smell of the grass, toasty, with the hint of distant forest fires, and lots of sweetness, like clean laundry.

I was still and attentive and I prayed and eventually some of my anger dissipated. After a while, I heard the car door open. It was as if, once things were more peaceful in me, the deer or the bobcat could come out of the thicket to case the joint. I heard his footsteps approach, and I sat up. When he came over, he was both, deer and bobcat, tentative, dangerous, and teary. He stood a few feet away, looking back at the car.

Finally he sighed, and began to speak. "I'm sorry I was such an asshole," he said. I'd sort of been hoping he'd say something I could report back to my pastor; but I saw how badly he felt, how lonely. "OK?" he said. I shook my head and sighed. "I'm sorry I was such an asshole, too," I said.

He sat down in the dirt and we talked in a stilted, unhappy way. I practiced being right for a while, and he was sullen; then I practiced being kind. Things improved a bit. My friend Mark, who works with church youth groups, reminded me recently that Sam doesn't need me to correct his feelings. He needs me to listen, be clear and fair and parental. But most of all he needs me to be alive in a way that makes him feel he could bear adulthood, because he is terrified of death, and that includes growing up to be one of the stressed-out, gray-faced adults he sees rushing around him.

"Now can we go back to Anthony's?" he asked, petulantly. We got up and walked to the car. I draped my arm around his shoulders like a sweater.

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