Jewells of Thought

For nearly three weeks my family was dealing with different emotions. Not only were we missing a family member during Thanksgiving, that person was also in seclusion from his family. That can be a very scary thing to deal with on so many levels on both sides of the coin.

Today marks a week since my brother came home from Indy. There’s always a trial period where things have to take a couple of days to a week to get back into a normal rhythm. We have been through this a lot over the years in different circumstances. It’s not always easy for us or for the person coming back home.

This morning was a surprise. Mom had a chiropractor appointment and usually my brother liked to drive her and go to Walmart. When neither of us could get an answer from him whether he was going or not we didn’t know what that meant. I had just begun to assemble things for chili. I even asked him to help me open some cans. When he finally sort of answered that he wasn’t going to go I countered him with an option. I totally didn’t believe he would actually go through with it though. So I said if you stay home you’re making the chili.

Right before I left with Mom the boiling bouillon water was filled with elbow pasta and then I turned off the stove. Thinking it would be most of the way cooked by the time we got back home. He stayed home because he wasn’t feeling good and I cannot remember the word he used. He has said confused recently a lot but that wasn’t the word this time.

Mom and I expected to have to wait to eat because we would have to put it all together. When we walked into the door there was a pot on the stove with a lid. The lid was not on the pot I was going to use before I left. I was stunned; the chili was fully cooked and everything I had out to the side of the stove was in it.

Even Dad said later he didn’t do anything with the chili, my brother already had it fixed by the time he got up. I truly did not expect that and neither did Mom. He surprised all three of us for dinner today. All we could do was marvel at his ability to forgo his ambient feelings and fix what will be our meal for a couple of days worth of chili.

It was a good day today. It was an accomplishment and hopefully another part of what will help him to achieve some homeostasis in his life in other words stability.