The strange noise was still reverberating in my head. It had abruptly awakened me from a deep, dreamless sleep. My wife was still sleeping, but our Golden Retriever Sadie was sitting up at attention, quietly growling at something across the moonlit bedroom.
I followed her stern gaze over to the walk-in closet on the opposite wall. The door was ajar and a weird, soft violet light illuminated from within. This was my wife’s closet, and the first thing to come to mind was the Oriental porcelain vase on the top shelf.
The vase contains the ashes of our late son, Tait.
I had barely registered this thought when suddenly I heard music playing in the front room. The realization of what was transpiring at that moment came over me like a heavy shroud. I knew that music. It was a sound that recalled happier days when our beloved son was just a toddler; when life seemed so simple and hopeful, and Prince Tait was the center of our universe and the sole object of our affection.
Tait’s old broken music box, displayed on the bookshelf, was inexplicably playing after many years of silent repose. The melancholy strains seemed to emanate from another realm: a place where weary spirits reside in the light at the end of the tunnel. Tears streamed down my face.
In a moment I recalled the tune: “Send in the Clowns.”
Isn’t it rich? Are we a pair?
Me here at last on the ground; you in mid-air
Send in the clowns…
Was Tait trying to communicate with his father? Was the little imp teasing me from the beyond? I was more amazed than afraid while my heavy heart hung on every note that chimed out in the darkness.
Tait had been born autistic with kidney damage. He had always needed a great deal of care, but what he had needed the most was love, and a great deal of patience. Like most autistic children, Tait had a very angelic face and strange ways. He sometimes spoke a language not of this earth, and often said things out of the blue that mystified us. He seemed to have psychic powers and could predict who would be calling on the phone or knocking at the door. He had been a magical little creature who taught us much more than we had taught him, and perhaps now he was again teaching me something — but what?
Isn’t it bliss? Don’t you approve?
One who keeps tearing around and one who can’t move.
But where are the clowns?
Send in the clowns…
…Sure of my lines… but no one is there…
The music began to retard, and the dark spaces between each note widened until the final sad tone faded into deathly silence.
I broke down and sobbed. I missed my little boy desperately and realized — all these years after his death — I hadn’t gotten over it. I had only gotten used to it.
Tait died on Thanksgiving Day in 1996 at the age of twenty-three. This year, his death date, the 28th, will once again fall on Thanksgiving. It’s going to be tough for Jayebird and me, but we’ll manage.
Tait Duncan: 1973-1996.
DC has been a frustrated musician for over fifty years, and now has decided to become a frustrated writer. Learn more at DCDuncan.com. He’ll keep you posted.