Old people.

"Dang-it" I look over to watch the small chunk of banana fall slowly onto the floor. The soft fleshy insides went flat amongst the cold winter surface. I find myself looking at it for a moment out of confusion that something which floated in the air did not simply land like a feather but more like a bowling ball. " I wanted that banana"
It's two pm and she is still in her pajamas. I laugh at her clumsy ways and she mumbles about babies. My cousins wife has just given born to a baby with down syndrome. This is horrible to my grandmother who has been looking forward to this young one's birth for quite a while. I could only imagine her scenic calendar of a cottage in some country landscape of nothing I have ever seen with Delicate February type and a gigantic red X on the day that Becky was supposed to give birth. My grandmother, a obsessive baby lover, loves all babies but only under certain conditions.
Considering I have a long history of working with people of disabilities sometimes I find these small statements under her breath offensive. When I look over at her with her hair in a moppy mess of curls on the top of her head, her small haunch back that looms over her fragile knees that desperately try to support the small movements that her feet make I realize that my grandmother is a world all onto herself. A world that she will impose on her children, sisters and grandchildren that contains reasonable arguments why I should be married right now and how a baby born with down syndrome is most horrible.
When she leaves I am back to my reality of making coffee, sewing or seeing whats on television. I am back to a grounded feeling. So today I am grateful for the short visitation of different realities that make you question what is real. Like a constant string of dreams that make you feel the hard surface of a counter top for reassurance . Is my life really four disabled men whose main concern is diet soda or a wobbly grandmother. Sometimes things like this make you pinch your skin or they are followed by "Is this really my life?"
Although sometimes I would like to ask for a trade in, I love my grandmother with all of me. She is one of those people who aren't very obvious which is enduring. I would assume if someone met me, they would naturally know me in a second. I could only imagine I would closely resemble a sheer table cloth hanging on a clothes line that flaps around without the real care that there is the terrifying fate of falling off and into the mud. My Grandmother on the other hand, you wouldn't tell from meeting her how wonderful she is inside. She is quiet and crinkles her nose while letting out something insulting occasionally. If meeting her for the first time, she is often on her best behavior. She is a mysterious skin which reminds me of my first discovery of chocolate caramel eggs. The immediate ambitious bite that was looking for solid chocolate now is filled with aching teeth and caramel that over loads your mouth and is finding other paths down your chin. One of those individuals that once you figure them out you feel like you have conquered the most puzzling questions about the universe.