“Jimmy came for the weekend and stayed eleven years.” By the early 1970s, when Schuyler had been living with the Porter family for about a decade, this was Anne Porter’s well-worn reply to puzzled acquaintances who, observing the unusual situation, would hesitantly ask, “Is Mr. Schuyler a relative of yours?” Delivered in a voice no louder than a whisper, her answer was nonetheless pointed and, in a manner typical of the woman Jimmy once called “the wittiest person I know,” deflected into wry humor a situation that started casually and warmly, but would gradually turn awkward, then painful, then traumatic over the course of those eleven or twelve years.
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