Volume 3, Issue 69: Cry All Day

"I'm gonna walk away slowly, instead I bid you good night."

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Last week, my wife and I dropped my oldest son William off at a sports camp. The camp is called McCallie Sports Camp, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and it looks like the most fun thing for a little boy in the whole world. Basically, for two weeks, all you do is eat—four meals a day, with an endless buffet of Boy Foods, pizza, hamburgers, ice cream—and play sports, all day, every day. You show up and get drafted into a “team,” and you and eight other kids then play on that team together all week—baseball, basketball, football, Ultimate Frisbee, water polo, something called “Flickerball.” You just run and play and eat and you get to do it for two weeks. His team is "Utah.” They seem like a good team.

As a kid, this would basically be my ideal camp. (They even have X-Box.) But as a parent, particularly one whose son had never been away at a sleepaway camp before, it was terrifying. I went to Lake Springfield Baptist Camp for one week every year between the ages of 8-13, and to flip through photos of the camp, today, 30-plus years later, is to riffle through the parts of my brain that get the most scared and the most lonely. I didn’t dislike camp, precisely, but I never quite got settled in at one of them either either. I always felt very far from where I was supposed to be, disjointed, and extremely, profoundly alone. By the end of the week, I was so desperate to come home that I’d inevitably wake up, on the final morning, before the sun came up, ready for the day to get overwith, ready to nestle back into normalcy.

My younger son Wynn, who turns seven today, just returned from a weeklong camp last Friday, and while I was worried about him being gone too, he is so charismatic, and so inherently silly, that I knew he’d be fine: He’s the sort of kid who shows up to camp the first day wearing his shirt backwards, and by the end of the week, everybody in his cabin is doing the same thing. It frazzled me a bit to have him off at his first camp, but I knew it was more my issue than his.

But William, the older son, is a little bit more sensitive: He’s quiet and cerebral and less eager to call attention to himself. He loves sports—the weirdest part of this week without him has been not having someone wake me up to ask whether the Cardinals won last night—but he’s not a jock and doesn’t have a lot of jock friends, which, I worried (because I worry), might make him different than the average kid who goes to a sports camp for two weeks. I figured he would be fine, and part of the point of sending him to camp in the first place was for him to learn the extremely valuable lifeskill of knowing how to interact and commingle with people he doesn’t know and might not have much in common with, but still: I worried. We worry! When we dropped him off last week, he looked nervous as he waved goodbye. Waving goodbye as well, I am certain we looked something quite worse.

It was fine, though, because we had a fail-safe. One of the camp activities was a field trip to an Atlanta Braves game, a 900minute drive from Chattanooga, and as it turned out, that Braves game was Friday night, against my St. Louis Cardinals. William knew that my dad and I would be at that night’s game, so we agreed that, before the game, I’d walk by his section and wave. He wouldn’t have to hang out with us, or hug us or anything, and I didn’t want to disrupt the camp experience. I’d just wave so he’d know he was there and I’d know he was there, and then he’d go back to camp and I’d go back home and we’d all see each other in a week. He would be at camp for five days when the Friday game came, essentially the midway point: My cameo appearance would be a sign he was halfway home.

We sent him daily emails with updates of what he was missing every morning, and the camp put up photos of everyone having a blast every day, photos I found myself poring through like the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Friday arrived. I told my Dad to hold my seat pregame so I could do my visit. I saw a gaggle of blue shirts out in the left field bleachers, so I knew that was the kids’ group.

I’d walk over, do my wave to William and then be back in time for first pitch. I was sure it would be hard for him, to see me and then have me leave, and I tried to be sensitive to that: I’d give my little wave, and then a thumbs-up, maybe a “Go Cards,” and then off he’d go back to camp, secure in the knowledge that his parents love him and miss him and would be waiting for him when this camp, this camp we hope he’s just having a blast at, was over. It’s hard to be away from your family. I just didn’t want to cause a scene. Don’t cry, William. Go back to camp. Have all the fun you can. We’ll be back for you in a week. It’s hard for us too.

Our seats were behind home plate, so it took about 10 minutes to make it to left field, but I noticed some kids wearing McCallie shirts in the concession lines, so I knew I was getting close. I kept my eyes peeled. Then I saw him. He was wearing his Cardinals hat, backwards (like he has been doing all week, something his dad frowns upon but he clearly adores), standing next to the kid we knew was his roommate and teammate on the Utah team. He didn’t see me, but because we’d talked about us all being at the game on Friday, I assumed he’d be looking around for me soon.

So I stood behind him, leaned over and said, “Hey, buddy, I think you’re in the wrong line.”

He turned around and looked up.

It was Daddy! Look, Daddy! Hey, Dad! I’ve missed you so much! Wow, I have so much to tell you! It is so good to see you. You are my father. I am the center of your world, and you are the center of mine, and while this time away has been good for me in a social-skills aspect, seeing you is a reminder that family is everything, and that you are a good father, and that we are a family and belong together and I cannot wait to get home and hang out and watch a game with you and Go Cardinals and I love you, Father, Happy Father’s Day weekend, let’s have a catch, yes, let’s have a catch, and celebrate the eternal bond between Father and Son.

That it is not precisely as I imagined it would go down. But probably something close.

This is what actually happened:

He blinked. He looked at me and blinked. Then he blinked again. He then looked to his friend, who also looked at me, and also blinked. No one said a word. I noticed one of the counselors next to them—counselors who are trying to corral more than 100 campers at a baseball game surrounded by 40,000 strangers, in a pandemic—starting to rustle. The counselor walked toward me. “Sir?” he said.

“Oh, sorry, I’m his father,” I said, starting to worry that I looked deranged. “I was just, uh, at the game, and I saw my son, so I thought I would say hi.” I looked at William. “So, uh, hi? Um, I hope you are having fun.” He still didn’t say a word.

“So, uh, I told your mom I’d take a picture if I saw you, so I’m going to take a picture,” I said. He nodded, not annoyed, but mostly bewildered: Hey, if it gets this guy to leave me alone to my friends faster, sure, man, take your picture. I took the picture. This is what the picture looked like.

I then said, “Uh, thanks. Well, have fun, I guess?”

Then he went back to the line. I turned to the counselor and apologized. I’m not sure why I did that, but I did. I then walked back to my seats, like I’d just run into a celebrity in public, asked for a photo, got turned down and ended up feeling embarrassed by the whole thing.

“How was William?” my dad said when I sat back down.
“Had better things to do than talk to his Dad,” I said.
“Welcome to the party, pal,” Dad said.

I know that this is good for my son, to develop, establish and build upon a life he has outside of his family, outside of the people who love him the most, because I know it was good for me, and that it is good for all children. I know that this is just the start, that his friends are about to become so much more fun for him to hang out with than his dumb old dad, if they haven’t become that already. I know that I cannot hold on tightly, that I do not want to hold on tightly, that my children are incredible people I absolutely cannot wait for the rest of the world to meet. I know this is how it works, and it is healthy, and that this separation is the foundation of a well-rounded, curious life. I’m proud of my sons, and can’t wait to see the young men they become, to see them tackle life with abandon, kindness, vigor and good cheer. Their lives are out there, not in here. It’s an incredible planet out there, and I want them to grab it and make it theirs.

I also know that last night shattered my heart into about 50,000 little pieces, right in front of my face. It was brutal. Man, it was just so brutal.

And it is, of course … just the start.

Here is a numerical breakdown of all the things I wrote this week, in order of what I believe to be their quality.

1. This Week in Genre History: Batman Begins, SYFY Wire. An incredible movie that may actually be a little underrated.

2. All-Star Team Predictions for 2026, MLB.com. The game will be in Philadelphia that year. I love Philadelphia.

3. Pixar Movies, Ranked and Updated, Vulture. With Luca.

4. Ten Lessons From Ten Father’s Days, Medium. A little Chicken Soup For The Parent’s Soul this week.

5. This Is the Biggest Challenge of Kevin Durant’s Career, New York. Fair to say he passed it.

6. I Did an Interview About Writing, Parenthood and Staying Sane, Creators Hub. Included, as always, because I typed the answers.

7. The Perils of Superteams, GQ. Of course, if the linchpin of your superteam is Kevin Durant, maybe you can figure it out anyway.

8. Internet Nostalgia: Balloon Boy, Medium. The story actually got weirder as we went along.

9. Six 2020 Playoff Teams in Trouble, MLB.com. It’d be handy if we could sneak all these teams in the playoffs this year too.

10. The Thirty: The Most Deserving All-Star on Every Team, MLB.com. You can actually find one on the Cardinals, if you look hard.

11. The Father’s Day Story I Publish Every Year, Medium. Written originally in 2003!

PODCASTS

Grierson & Leitch, we discussed “In the Heights,” “Infinite” and “Sideways.”

Seeing Red, Bernie and I have noticed that the Cardinals are now very bad.

Waitin' Since Last Saturday, no show this week.

LONG STORY YOU SHOULD READ THIS MORNING … OF THE WEEK

“The Four Americas,” George Packer, The Atlantic. So much to unpack in this massive, incredible Atlantic cover story, but I keep coming back to this paragraph:

I think about that exact thing, and my hometown, constantly.

Also, this story about Opal Lee, who has been fighting for decades to make Juneteenth a national holiday, is well worth reading this morning.

ARBITRARY THINGS RANKED, WITHOUT COMMENT, FOR NO PARTICULAR REASON

Remaining Playoff Teams, Ranked by How Much I Am Hoping They Win the NBA Title

1. Milwaukee

2. Phoenix

3. Atlanta

4. LA Clippers

5. Philadelphia

6. Brooklyn

ONGOING LETTER-WRITING PROJECT!

I am sorry I have fallen behind on these. I have a lot of bookplates! I will return! They are piling up, but once I get the bookplates done, we’ll get caught up.

I promise. Keep writing. I will get caught up!

Write me at:

Will Leitch
P.O. Box 48
Athens GA 30603

CURRENTLY LISTENING TO

“Turn It On,” Sleater-Kinney. I’m seeing Sleater-Kinney play with Wilco in August—first post-pandemic show!—and I cannot wait. I’ve been getting caught back up on my Sleater-Kinney, and holy shit, they are awesome. This album rules. I miss the ‘90s so, so much.

Remember to listen to The Official Will Leitch Newsletter Spotify Playlist, featuring every song ever mentioned in this section.

Also, to repeat, this little person is seven years old today:

And these people have been married 50 years ago today.

So, big day.

Have a great weekend, all.

Best,
Will