Brian's at Brown

We eat Thai food
Because it seems appropriate
When we talk about Brian
Brian's at Brown

We laugh about our cousin
The one who wrote for the New Yorker
Who wrote the recommendation letter
Sprinkled with names
Of people this cousin had profiled
For the New Yorker

Yes, THE New Yorker
That one
The important magazine
For important people
The one that nobody actually reads

The one in which famous people get profiled
By our cousin

Our cousin who dropped the names
Of all those people
In his letter for Brian

Names of Senators
Names of Chefs
Names of Celebrities

It's a little like the house that Jack built

This is the letter that our cousin wrote
Not my husband's cousin
Or my cousin
But our cousin

Because we're married
Because our families have melded
Because mothers and fathers
And sisters and brothers
And Brian
Are all ours

This is the letter
This is the cousin
These are the names
That got Brian into Brown

These are the parents
Who laugh at the jokes
That the parents of Brian's new roommate tell

We've known these two people
For less than an hour
Yet here we are
Eating Thai
And comparing our liberal viewpoints
While anecdotes assuage
Our notable differences

For example, we're smart
They're idiots

We have children
We have college-age children
We have just released our children
Into the vast collegiate landscape

We have succeed as parents

We have children at Brown
Brian's at Brown

We won

And no, he's not at Harvard
And no, he's not at Yale
And no, our mother
My mother, not his mother
But still, our mother
Melded families, remember?

Brian's grandmother did not sound as impressed
As we would have liked
When Brian got the acceptance letter

She knew about the other letter
The one that our cousin wrote
The letter full of names
The one that got him into Brown

And our mother said--

'Couldn't you have sent the letter to somewhere better? Like Princeton?'

Not realizing we did
We sent it everywhere
Apparently, some colleges got better letters
With bigger names
From cousins and nieces and uncles
That work at better magazines
Like Time or National Geographic
Magazines people actually read
Instead of stacking on their coffee tables

But Brown was impressed
With our letter full of names
So Brian's at Brown

And we have delivered him
Safe unto Providence
And we will soon return
After spending an unnecessary three days here
Telling ourselves we're helping him
Get "adjusted"

We will go back to New York
We will take up hobbies
We will go to the theater more
We will sit in silence in a silent living room
Looking at our New Yorkers

We will pay tuition
And we will brag
To all our friends

We will never speak to any of our friends
Whose children got into better schools
Ever, ever again

We'll say we're too busy to call
But in all actuality
We're simply jealous
That they had better letters full of better names

We will miss him
We will miss our son
We will beg him to study law
And he will study theater
Because that's just Brian

We will visit on Parent's Week
We will pay for his return tickets
For every insignificant holiday
Between now and June

We will fly him home on Arbor Day
Because we're buying a tree for the patio
And it will be important to celebrate it

We will think about having another kid
We will think about adopting a child
We will go a little crazy, as previous statements indicate
But we will be all right

We will imagine him
Our little boy

A magnet for girls
A magnificent smile
A man among men

We will send him care packages
With DVD's, with canned food
With hundred dollar bills
When we told each other
We would not send any more money
But instead we will send even more money
Than we said we wouldn't send
We will, of course we will

We will worry about him constantly
We will call eight times a day
We will try to sense if he's doing drugs
By the way he picks up the phone
And says 'Hello'
At seven in the morning

We will wonder if he's gay
We will assume he's gay
We will mourn the girl he's never going to marry
We will ask him if he wants to bring his friend 'Chris' home for Thanksgiving
We will get over it
Then we will find out
That 'Chris' is 'Christine'
And we will hug her
But secretly feel
That he could do better

And I will personally be a little sad
That he's not gay
Because my friend Lisa's son recently came out
And now they take cooking classes together
And I'm a little envious

We will go to his graduation
Four long years from now
And think about those first three days

We will think about the Thai food
The parents of the roommate
Who dropped out two days in
And was replaced by a lovely boy from Spain
Named Ca-something

We will watch him cross the stage
We will not cry
We will not cry
We will not--damn

We will be so proud
It will be as if
We have cured cancer
While making the perfect omelet

That is our son
That is our Brian
And our mother
My mother
Brian's grandmother

She never graduated high school
So she can go
As they say
Fuck herself

Brian's at Brown
Right now
He's at Brown
And we're here
Eating Thai
Wondering if we should rush to the dorm
And take him home

Pretend he's not eighteen
Lock him in a closet
Embrace insanity

Or just keep eating
Keep laughing
And keep looking at each other
As if to ask--

Are you okay?
No, I'm okay
But are you?
Are you okay?

Brian's at Brown
Now where do we go?