I try not to watch the clock. My boy, Santiago—always punctual—should’ve been home an hour ago. Maybe the JV B-ball tryouts ran long. Easier to think that rather than scarier things. I’m not used to this. Usually, I’d be at work, unaware how his mom would’ve handled things. She knew the way.

Santiago bursts through the back door into the kitchen. He’s over the moon, Cheshire cat grin; ignores me, drops his backpack onto the table, rattling the plates and glasses I’d set there, and makes a b-line to the fridge and drinks milk from the container. I didn’t think teenagers drank milk.

I’m thinking he made the team, and he’s dying to tell me, but….

He grabs his backpack. “I’ll be in my room.” He turns away.

“Hello?”

“Oh, hey, Dad. Call me when dinner’s ready?”

“Santiago?”

“Call me Jimmy, okay Dad?”

“In front of your friends, I’ll call you Jimmy. At home, indulge me, okay?”

He groans and makes a face. “Deal.”

“What’s the rush?”

“Gotta call somebody.”

“Text?”

“Call. You know, talk.”

“Do people still talk on phones? To whom? Will you use more than monosyllables?”

“Dad….”

I don’t know the way this all works.

I cook dinner. Santiago’s radar guides him to the table where I ask, “What about tryouts?”

“List up Monday.”

“What’s got you jazzed?”

“Jazzed?”

“You’re like a puppy chewing on a slipper.”

“Slipper?”

“Never mind.”

“Met a girl.”

“You’ve met girls before.”

“But you know, we’re—you know….”

I’m a newly widowed dad who’d been a ninth grader a hundred years ago. I don’t know. I remember. My imagination runs wild.

“Did being with a girl make you late?”

“I walked her home after tryouts.”

I’m getting an education. Some kids still talk—though not to parents. Boys still walk girls home from school. But I still don’t know the “you know….”

“Her name’s Maureen. She’s pretty and blonde and she likes me.”

These facts are supposed to check all my boxes. Still, I recall meeting her and her mother, also widowed, at a school concert. Maureen is pretty and smart—and funny. I’d been surprised kids had a sense of humor. Her mother seems on top of child raising things, unlike me. Buena elección, Santiago.

“Dad? I need to make fifteen dollars.”

Can kids buy crack for fifteen bucks? “Why’s that?”

“Just do. Got any work for me?”

“Absolutely.”

“Can I start tonight?”

“Tomorrow’s fine.”

The next day, Saturday, Santiago (Jimmy) earns his pay, working his butt off helping me around the house.

I hand him a ten and a five. “Will you tell me?”

“Huh?”

“What’s the money for?”

“Dad….”

I sigh, “Okay.”

Santiago relents. He shows me a picture on his phone of a bracelet he wants to give Maureen. Something else I didn’t know kids still did. It looks a little cheap. There are other, nicer bracelets for a few dollars more. I suggest he look at those, but his heart is set on that one.

Sunday afternoon, I drive Santiago—no, Jimmy—to the store and he chooses the bracelet he wants. I suggest why not check out others I think are better value.

“Daaad….”

“It’ll take a minute.”

I show him one I think is better.

“It’s nice,” he says, “but….”

“But…?”

“Maureen likes this one. I asked. She chose.”

He’s asked, so he knows.

My smart boy, good Saint Jimmy, shows me I have much to learn on my way to becoming patient, a better listener, a better father.

He has guided my first steps on El Camino de Santiago.