My favorite photograph of Susan Sontag

I love this photograph of Susan Sontag with her son, David.

Their relaxed demeanor, her loving gaze, they know each other well as friends and family.

Sigrid Nunez, a woman whom David dated and who lived with them for two years wrote about Susan and David's relationship:

[S]he always insisted that she and David were different from ordinary mothers and sons. She liked to think of herself as David’s “goofy older sister.” It wasn’t neediness that made her want to keep David with her, she’d tell people, but her enormous love for him.

Susan Sontag loved lists. This one about raising a child, she put out in 1959, when David was seven years old. 

1. Be consistent.
2. Don't speak about him to others (e.g., tell funny things) in his presence. (Don't make him self-conscious.)
3. Don't praise him for something I wouldn't always accept as good.
4. Don't reprimand him harshly for something he's been allowed to do.
5. Daily routine: eating, homework, bath, teeth, room, story, bed.
6. Don't allow him to monopolize me when I am with other people.
7. Always speak well of his pop. (No faces, sighs, impatience, etc.)
8. Do not discourage childish fantasies.
9. Make him aware that there is a grown-up world that's none of his business.
10. Don't assume that what I don't like to do (bath, hairwash) he won't like either.