Hello Darkness, My Old Friend

his grip. Uncomfortable about what he had done, he was nevertheless still angry at me. I had never encountered such intensity from my mother or so much ferocity from my father. Concern for me had moved him to this violent act. There could be no other reason; he had always been gentle. My parents were united in their determination to keep me from returning to New York City. But they were also terrified because they realized that the eventual outcome might not be to anyone’s liking.

The taxi took my mother and me on the familiar route from La Guardia Airport through Harlem and then on to Columbia. It was a warm day in the early fall of 1961. As we approached the campus, my mother described the crowded streets and those old, stolid buildings. The day I had hoped and fought for had arrived—and I no longer wanted it. The decaying odors and heavy air of the neighborhood screamed at me, telling me that the day was all too real. I slouched down, my heart sinking. I thought of the unsettled nights since that scene at the dinner table.

My mother came with me only as far as my old dormitory hallway, where I knew my way around. There was no one else in the hall. The pale concrete blocks were all there was—them and me. We said a quick goodbye. A kiss on the cheek, and she was gone. I didn’t want to picture what was in her heart just then; I had my own immediate problems.

I felt my way down the hall. Then I was standing at an old wooden doorframe that I could feel was gouged and dented from the comings and goings of generations of students. A threshold. There was nothing behind the door except my old room. The doorway’s lintel seemed small—I could feel the top as I reached up, hesitating to enter. All I had to do was open the door and walk through.

I could still turn around, I thought, make it down the hall and outside to the street with my old green suitcase, hail a cab, pick up my mother at her hotel, and return to the airport. We’d be in Buffalo by nightfall. A known life was waiting for me there—its jaws wide open, dripping safety. Although it was not the life I had imagined for myself, it was still a life, and I could try to make it a good life.

Before me, on the other hand, there was only the possibility of a life, a possibility so tenuous it seemed improbable. If I opened that door, I would have to go into the room. If I walked into the room, I would have to put my suitcase down. I would stand there alone. The room would smell musty, from the dust burning off the old heaters. I would have to unpack, feel my way around to the dresser, open the drawers, and put away my clothing. I would painstakingly struggle to separate my underwear from my socks, from the T-shirts, and from the slacks so I could get dressed with a minimum of fumbling. I would immediately begin to cut my fingers along the edges of the fraying wood drawers.

I thought about my old Buffalo neighborhood and how I knew it by heart. I knew the neighbors’ faces and the positions of the trees, the lawns, the stores, and the junkyard. Everything was in its proper place. What did I know of New York City after two years? Proportionally very little. The city was of gargantuan scale and ever changing. If I stayed, I would have to conjure an image of everything I would ever confront: every building, everything I touched, every book I read (correction: that was read to me), every face, every hand I shook. I would have to marry voices with my own constructs of images of people I had never seen. Was my imagination capable of that? Would my mind be able to retain and process it all?

And Sue would probably not wait for me, I thought. Things would simply intervene for her, the way life intervenes. She might get an opportunity to pursue her education elsewhere, far from Buffalo. There might be a boy she would meet who, she would decide in her practical way, was a better choice. What woman would want to wait for me to take her elbow so that she could open doors for me, lead me around rooms, lead me to tables at dinner, make sure I did not eat the garnish, make sure my clothing matched? The list of difficulties rolled on and on in my thoughts. My stomach hurt, as did my head.

If I stayed, my downfall would just be a matter of time. I would be doomed. Not in some metaphoric sense but literally: walking out into traffic at the wrong time; stumbling down stairs; slipping in the shower; getting out of a chair and falling, hitting my head on the desk next to mine. To live this new life of mine outside the safety of home would be to thread the needle.

There was still no one else in the hallway. The other students were not back from vacation, and the campus had a hollow, desolate feel. The boys from good families would still be in their large stone houses in fine neighborhoods. Drivers would bring them back when classes resumed, or they would travel into the city on their own, not a care in the world, just eager to get back into the swing of things. Maybe not eager for the academic work but certainly for hanging out with the guys, goofing around, going to the football games or basketball games or crew meets. Going to fraternity parties and exploring the city and getting into trouble.

That part of my life was over, and I knew it. There would be no free time. I would have to work on my studies during all my waking hours—and almost all