It's early in the evening. Dinner has been cleared and put away. I'm finishing up a column at the computer. Out of the blue, Eli comes up to me and asks, "Why are you always writing about me?"
      I'm taken aback. How does he know that's what I'm doing? I sputter out a reply, "Well, I write books for families. And now I'm writing a column for the paper about our family. It helps other people think about how they want to be with their kids. It's what I do."
      "But I don't like it when you write about me."
      What does he mean, "He doesn't like it?" He doesn't even read! I've never discussed my articles with him. Where is this coming from?
      I try to keep my voice calm as I ask, "What bothers you about it, Eli?"
      "I like to be private," he replies.
      I don't know what to say so I don't say anything.

      I somehow make it through our evening routine, a mechanical robot. Inside, my mind is racing. I'm blown away. I thought I'd have to deal with this later — maybe when Eli was eight or ten. Deep inside, I've had doubts about subjecting my children to a public life they didn't choose. It isn't easy having a writer for a mother, or for that matter, as a daughter, sister, lover, or friend. Everyone I've been close to and written about has had a hard time with me writing about their lives. Invariably, I knew the day of reckoning would come with my children. But at five?

      I wrack my brain, trying to imagine what could have set Eli off. I recall an incident at Frederick Street Park two weeks earlier. Eli and Lizzy were on swings side by side. A dad came up to me, said he recognized me from my picture in Growing Up In Santa Cruz. He told me one of my columns had been on his fridge all month. We chatted for a few minutes. He smiled at Eli, and said, "You must be Eli." A week later it happened again. Someone I didn't know told me how much she liked the column, then turned to Eli and said, "I feel like I know you."

      Late that night, I tell Karyn about my conversation with Eli. She replies, "You know how I feel. I don't like it either. You write about Eli being an introvert and then everyone expects him to be an introvert. You say he hits his sister and people starting thinking of him as this aggressive kid who hurts his sister. People lock him into an identity. And pretty soon, Eli starts to think of himself in those same ways. It doesn't give him room to grow."

      The next morning, I call Bryan, Eli's big brother in Boston. I ask him what he thinks. He says, "I never liked it when my mom talked to her friends about me."
      "But I'm a writer, Bryan. This is what I do."
      His answer is immediate and emphatic: "I think the kid has to come first."

      I call Ellen Bass. She's written publicly and personally for years. Her daughter Sara has appeared in numerous poems and publications and is old enough now to reflect on the experience. Plus, Ellen knows Eli really well. I ask her advice.
      She says, "Sara never really noticed that I was writing about her. It wasn't an issue for her." She pauses, collecting her thoughts, then goes on: "You can write nationally in a way that you can't locally. Even if your column was in the Mercury News, then Eli wouldn't have to be nose to nose with it. I don't think he should have 100% veto power over everything you write, but I think you have to stop publishing your column here in Santa Cruz. This is a small town. What you write about him here is going to have an impact on his life."
      She pauses, then goes on, "It's amazing, really — the very thing that makes your column so compelling — Eli's sensitivity and his precociousness with language — are the very things that are going to end it prematurely."
      Ellen tells me about a conversation she had with poet Sharon Olds, who often wrote about her kids. In hindsight, Olds said she might have started her career using a pseudonym if she'd realized the impact her writing would have on her children.
      I feel all jumbled up inside. Yet I press on: "Ellen, I want you to tell me the truth. I trust you. You're a public person and you also know how important it is to protect your kids."
      "It's hard for me to imagine how you can keep writing about Eli so intimately right here where he lives. He's going to be able to read very soon. What will you say to him when he comes back and tells you, 'I told you I didn't want you to do this'? I don't see how you can reconcile that. It's one thing to say to him, 'I didn't realize it would bother you.' But a kid like Eli is going to say, 'But don't you remember, I told you I didn't want you to write about me when I was five!"
      In my gut, I know she's right. I've known it ever since Eli and I talked. But I am heartsick. I love this column. It's my one link to my life as a writer. It keeps me connected to this community. It touches people. "But I'm a writer," I tell her, my voice starting to shake. "Writing intimately about my life is what I do. It's the vulnerability of the writing that gives it its power. This isn't just a hobby for me. This is my life's work. Am I just supposed to shut down as a writer?"
      "Don't stop writing the column. Just stop publishing it locally. You never know. When Eli is older, he might feel differently."
      "But Ellen, I'm not the kind of writer who can write and not publish it. I've always written for an audience. I write to connect with people. My writing has always come from what's deepest in my heart and right now, parenting is what's there. If I don't write about this, there won't be anything to write about."
      "I know. But you have to put him first."
      There's a long silence. I am near tears. It feels like my one creative outlet is being taken away. Quietly, Ellen says, "I really feel for you, Laura. Who would have thought you'd have to deal with this so quickly? What a blow."

      Minutes after we hang up, my friend Ray Gwyn Smith calls to tell me how much she liked my last column. "Wait till I tell you what's happening," I say, launching into a short version of my struggle.
      Ray identifies with Eli immediately: "As a child, I was very gifted artist. I'd do a painting and it would be sent off and shown somewhere. I felt like I didn't own myself. I felt like my mother owned me. That's why I stopped painting for so many years. I know this is a huge loss for you, but this is his life." She pauses, then adds, "It's extraordinary that he gets to define his own boundaries. I wish I'd had that."

      Over the next days and weeks, I talk to a number of friends and writing colleagues about how to handle my dilemma. I get a variety of answers. Lots of people suggest I start writing about Lizzy, since she's not yet old enough to complain, but the fact is she doesn't exist in a vacuum. Having brothers is an integral part of her life. I can't write about her without Eli being one of the stock characters. Besides, I don't have to stretch the same way with Lizzy as I do with him. With Eli, there's always plenty to write about.

      I send my cousin Michelle an e-mail. She is a writer with a lot of publications under her belt. She writes back from Rhode Island: "You can't imagine how much I feel for you. What an ironic, funny, horrible, confining, and unexpected request.
      "I think you can only write one more column that tells your readers that Eli doesn't want you to make his private life public and that you are going to honor it the way you would want him to honor the same request from you.
      "The basic problem is that the paper's in the same town! If you could get the columns taken in LA or Lake Tahoe, it would be different, and he possibly wouldn't care.
      "I'd have to say you don't have a choice in the case of the newspaper, since his name is being used and you are so well-known. I don't think there's a choice here. Even though you're the one on the losing side, I hope you don't think Eli's being unfair. He isn't. He's asking for what we all deserve.
      "There are definitely other forms in which you could write about Eli that he would have to honor (fiction, plays, books), but he doesn't need to have the whole town in on his struggles and personal growing up, with names and dates and people watching."

      This last e-mail clinches it for me. It comes down to what I value most. Is it my "right" and need for self-expression? My career as a writer? My responsibility to my audience? My pleasure in writing the column and getting praise for it? Or is it my son's feelings and right to control his own life? Weighing all of it, I know Eli has to come first. With a heavy heart and a clear conscience, I decide to give up the column.

      But before I call Jennifer and Kim to make it official, I go to my bimonthly parenting group with Janis Keyser. I share what's happened and the conclusions I've drawn. Janis says she doesn't think the column has to be a lost cause. "You need to find out exactly what Eli means when he says he 'doesn't like it.' Does he want people to stop coming up to him in the park and talking to him? Is he tired of overhearing conversations about something you wrote? Does he resent the fact that you're spending time writing instead of being with him? You need to find out from him precisely what he's saying 'no' to. I don't think he's completely expressed his idea about it." She takes a breath, then adds, "Don't let all those other people speak for Eli."
      "Try asking him if there's a way you could continue that might feel comfortable for him. Perhaps if you read the columns to him, he could choose the ones that feel okay. Or there might be certain stories about him he'd like you to tell. And it's entirely possible that using another name might make all the difference for him."

      The next day, I take the kids to San Francisco to visit old friends. That night, as Eli and I lay in our makeshift bed listening to city traffic, I say, "Eli, I talked to Janis last night about my column. She said I should try to find out exactly what it is that bothers you about it. So can I ask you some questions about it?"
      "Okay."
      "Is the hard part me telling stories about our family?"
      "No."
      "Is the hard part having people come up and talk to you about it?"
      "Yeah!"
      "But you don't care if I write it?"
      "I want you to be able to write your column and I don't want people to talk to me about it."
      "How about if I wrote a column asking people not to talk to you anymore? Most people would listen, and if someone made a mistake and talked to you, maybe we could figure together what we could say to them."
      "That wouldn't work!"
      "You really feel upset when people talk to you about it."
      "I feel so upset I want to tell them to shut up."
      "So, Eli, let me get this straight. It's not what I write that bothers you, it's that people talk to you about it."
      "Yeah!"
      "How about if I think about some ways to get people to stop talking to you about it."
      "Okay, Mama. That sounds good."

      So here's my first shot at a solution that takes both of our needs into account. It's going to start with new identities for everyone in my family. From now on, this column will no longer be written by Laura Davis. It will no longer be about Eli, Bryan, Lizzy and Karyn. Photos of us will no longer accompany these words. Readers new to the paper will be fooled into granting us our privacy. My hope is that in time, even some of you who've faithfully read every column will forget our true identities. Maybe you could even help the process along through a little selective amnesia.
      For those of you who do know us, I make the following requests: