Tim Dowling: the oldest one is moving out – and this time it feels final
I’ll have no one to watch Deadwood with any more, but at least we can fix the ceiling in his bedroom
For the last couple of months, a dining room table has been squatting over the coffee table in our living room, like one animal threatening another. It’s not in the way exactly, but it’s still a strangely oppressive use of space. Anyway, in a few days it will be gone.
The oldest one is leaving home for the third time – or the fourth, if you count going to university, which I do, because I cried that time, my vision blurring as I tried to punch my registration number into a car park ticket machine.
The other times were less fraught. In 2018 he left in a taxi on a snowy night; in 2019 he returned and stayed through the pandemic.
The last time he moved out I drove him and his stuff across London in a hired van; two years later I picked him up in the car, his possessions having dwindled to a point where only one trip was necessary. I allowed myself to get used to the idea that he would always, eventually, return.
This time seems more permanent – he’s moving in with his girlfriend, and they have purchased, among other things, a dining room table. Boxes keep getting delivered but never opened, because they’re not staying. Some of them contain new pots and pans, others plates and bowls. One of them, I think, is an air fryer.
Suddenly, in conjunction with the oldest one’s imminent departure, a lot of stalled stuff is getting under way. The restoration of the partially caved-in ceiling in his bedroom – the result of a roof leak that got fixed back in September – has been on hold until he vacated the premises.
“I texted Mark,” my wife says, referring to the builder she sometimes calls Mark No Problem, the better to contrast his straightforward, can-do approach to home improvement with mine. “Just to see if he could make a start on the ceiling.”
“What did he say?” I say.
“He said, ‘No problem.’”
“I myself foresee many problems,” I say.
“Of course you do,” my wife says.
What I mean is: we’ve built up a considerable backlog of problems for Mark to solve. There is, for example, the collapsing garden structure out back, whose overdue repair has been complicated in large part because I refuse to speak its name.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” my wife says.
“Yes you do,” I say. “The outdoor skeleton room. The climbing frame for plants.”
“Oh my God,” she says. “Just say pergola.”
“I’d rather die,” I say. “But whatever you call it, it’s about to fall over.”
“The pergola,” she says.
“The wood around the bolts has rotted through,” I say. “It’s not safe.”
“Mark’s coming by on Friday, so you can tell him about it yourself,” she says.
“How am I gonna do that?” I say.
That evening, after my wife has gone to bed, the oldest one and I sit down to watch television, as is our habit.
“When do you get the keys?” I say.
“I can pick them up tomorrow after five,” he says. “Then a van is coming here the next day.” I realise that for the first time I have played no part in him moving.
We watch in silence for a while, occasionally checking our phones, as is our habit.
“What are we gonna do about Deadwood?” he says.
We have been steadily working our way through the classic western epic for the last few weeks, but we’re still on series one, and there are two others to follow.
“I don’t know,” I say. “We could try watching the whole thing in the next two days.”
“There’s, like, 30 more hours of it,” he says.
“We could at least finish series one,” I say.
“I’m not in tomorrow night,” he says.
“Or we could watch it separately, while video calling,” I say.
“Are you gonna be able to manage that?” he says.
“I suppose our screenings might get out of sync,” I say.
“Yeah,” he says.
I don’t say what I’m thinking, which is: we could just watch it alone, in our own time, and then have a chat about it at Christmas.
And I don’t say what occurs to me next, which is: without him here, under this roof, I will never watch another episode of Deadwood again.