Debts

He kept a meticulous account of everything he owed other people.

He paid his taxes early. He returned borrowed things promptly. He showed up when he said he would show up and called when he said he would call and kept the commitments that other people depended on with a reliability that everyone around him took, eventually, as given.

He was fifty-one before someone asked him what he owed himself.

The question arrived at a dinner party, from a woman he barely knew, who asked it in a way that suggested she wasn't expecting a deep answer — just making conversation. He gave a light answer and moved on. But the question came home with him.

What did he owe himself?

He sat with it for weeks. He had never thought about it in those terms. He thought about what he owed his children, his parents, his colleagues, his friends. He had never turned the accounting on himself.

What he owed himself, he realised, was rest. Real rest, not the rest that was secretly preparation for more productivity. He owed himself honesty about what he actually wanted, as distinct from what he'd decided was acceptable to want. He owed himself at least one relationship in which he was allowed to need something.

He owed himself a great deal.

He started paying the debt slowly. Imperfectly. With the uncertainty of someone who has neglected an account for too long and isn't sure where to begin.

But he started.