November 19, 2001
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Late November Day
Fresh bread bakes, soup bubbles on the stovetop, ingredients for peanut butter cookies wait on the recently wiped countertop. The kids are sitting around the dining room table playing ker-plunk (more or less happily). Holiday ribbons and lights brighten the house. People move with unhurried steps to the rhythm of slow rain dripping.
It's an unusual gathering today. My grandmother lies in the hospital bed while we take turns sitting and reading to her or just helping her to be comfortable. Mom, Aunt Pat and I vacuum, sweep, wash, wipe, chop and dice. Three little boys keep us from relaxing too much.
All the "working" people, are gone to their jobs. We are here minding the home that has become the hub of all our lives. At first I thought it was a sad thing that my grandmother's illnes was dragging out. I felt sorry for her prolonged suffering. But I've come to see it differently. Her dying has become the controlling event in our schedules.
The rhythm of family often serves as the unheard metronome. Jobs, deadlines, and needs make up the percussive element of our ordinary lifesong. But when the family beat takes over, we are moved to a place outside time and timing.
The holiday we are preparing to celebrate could be happening any year. There is nothing special that ties this observance to 2001. The Thanksgiving lists the children have been making up could have been written last year, or twenty years ago when my sisters and brother were the children. They are thankful for candy, games, cousins to play with, Mom and Dad.
Funny, I'm thankful for the same things.
Comments (10)
Great post!!
: )
God Bless - Dale
I dunno. Somehow, I think your kids have more to be thankful for. They aren't under the constant threat of "tickle torture" from three sisters!!!!
Oh, the things I'll eventually tell my therapist.
Sounds like a day for making memories. Have fun.
The more things change?
Wormy is worried about tickle torture. I distinctly remember trying to walk around the house with a sibling sitting indian style around each leg forcing me to drag them with every step I tried to take.
I'm probably thankful for that too, I think.
I am glad you are in town right now ... it takes some of Mom's critical focus off of ME!!! (seriously) - it is nice to have a chance to spend some time just being "quiet".
It's a beautiful word picture. You concluded perfectly; before getting to the last paragraph I was picturing the scene and it faded so easily from time frame to another. The characters moved through the house and with each step the trimmings and trappings changed but the family and the home remained, unaffected.
Thanks!
I'm thankful for YOU
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