And even now, when I am involved in some dull task such as washing dishes or vacuuming my over-priced one-bedroom apartment - but it is in a good neighborhood, and the building has a doorman - I become aware that I am working in time to a rhythm of dull thuds that runs through my mind still, but when I pause and listen hard there is only silence and 1 re­member that 1 am alone, an adult, and Danny is far away.

This is what happened:  John was 27 years old, recently out of law school, making himself some decent money, with muscles in all the right places and a sense of humor, when he met Miriam, a quiet girl from a nice family, who had dimples when she smiled and breasts to go with them, and they got married. They had a daughter, and then they had a son, named Daniel. Now the daughter, Hannah, was a fine, ordinary child, and they were proud parents, but Danny! Danny was joy, Danny was the SUN. He actually GLOWED, his blue eyes sparkled, his teeth glinted, his hair was gold, with his chubby arms he hugged everyone in sight and they went from him HAPPY. There was no one, no one in the whole world, like Danny.

John figured that Danny would grow up to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, but he was young yet, plenty of time. Miriam didn't worry, just cooked, baked, cleaned for her family and was happy, her dimples often visible.

There are worse things in this life than being a juggler. One could, for example, be a failed juggler. Or one could, for example, be a juggler who fails to try. Or one might feel that juggling was not suitable, and refuse.

This is what happened: One day a small boy bent his neck backward, pointed his

eyes to the sky, and saw red, purple, yellow spheres falling out of the clouds, resting, for a moment, in huge, sure hands, and then being sent back. He was afraid. What if he dropped one?

That was John, who became a marvel at racquet sports of all kinds, involving hitting balls away from him, as hard as he could, over and over and over again.

Another day, a fine day, another small boy saw the same sight, and was not afraid. He reached up to the sky, and he was one of the lucky ones: He had the hands.      Not many have the hands.

When Danny started running home from school, sprinting up to his room to practice, coming to dinner long after he was called, gulping down his stuffed lobster or poached salmon, skipping the chocolate mousse and running back upstairs for more practice, the child psychiatrists said not to worry. "It's a phase," they said. "It's just a phase he's going through."

One night, when Danny was about ten, he interrupted whatever delicacy was on the menu to ask if he could go to circus camp that summer. John didn't even pause to consider it.

"No way, Jose," he said.

"Why not?" Danny asked.

"I can't bear the thought of my precious little boy cleaning up elephant crap," John said.

It was about then that John stopped melting inside when Danny would describe a new trick, named just for him ­ "Father's Folly" was the one with two apples and an egg, where a bite got taken from alternating apples on each rotation until they were almost gone, and the grand finale was when the egg (raw) was the recipient of the bite. That one didn't even get a smile, although I have to hand it to him, John never stopped trying, despite the heart-fissure that widened a bit each day. "Be sure to floss afterwards," he said. And that was when his tone of voice as he said "My son an airhead" began to change from fondness to exasperation to despair, and it was then that he began the long, painful, and arduous process of pulling out his hair, strand by strand by strand, because, despite the continued assurances of the string of psychiatrists, almost all of whom wound up learning to juggle (Danny was a patient and encouraging teacher), John and eventually Miriam determined that the juggling was not a phase, not even a long phase, but a problem.

And it was about that time that I last saw Danny juggle. Without announcing it, without giving us advance warning, without giving us another chance, Danny stopped juggling for people. From then on he practiced alone, behind a closed door. I couldn't look out the bay window in the living room on a sunny day and see colored balls flying through the air. And I couldn't play my favorite game, which was for Danny to juggle flaming torches on the front lawn while I counted how many cars slowed to watch. He'd still announce when he'd mastered a new trick - he didn't stop talking about it for a week when he learned to balance a ball on his nose, flip it to the back of his neck and then roll it down his right arm - but he wouldn't show us. "I'm putting together a whole act," he'd say. "When it's finished, I'll show you."

The memory of those years, our teen years, is vivid. Even the smell of those years is still clear; the war between the odors of new paint and that of rich, creamy foods, a smell I had thought was unique to our house but that I occasionally detect in new, upscale restaurants.

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