Matching Tracksuits

"Padre, when you get a chance, can you fill my two water bottles," the Girl asked standing at the top of the stairs after checking on her bath water.

"Of course," I said, finishing up a couple of dishes. As I headed up the stairs, I suppressed a giggle about it. Instead of going to L's room, I headed straight to ours. K was reading in bed.

"I hope she realizes this is a temporary thing," I said to my wife. Laughing, I continued, "'Padre, can you make me some tea?' 'Padre, can you get me a nose hose ready?' 'Padre, can you get me some gauze?' 'Padre, can you fill my two water bottles?'" K just smiled.

In truth, helping her this week has been a pleasure. Helping your daughter recover from a minor surgery is so much less stressful than sitting with her in an emergency room. With the latter, there's no clear outcome. Too many unknowns. Helping her through this post-operative trial, though, has been simply helping her through very clearly and well-defined steps. We know what happens next. It's just a matter of dealing with the present discomfort, which will most definitely pass.

That being said, I thought L might try to go it alone. To strike out and try to take care of herself as a show of a now-eighteen-year-old young woman. Heaven knows there's a stubborn streak in our family that's as wide as it is deep. "I can do it." "I don't need help." That's been L the last few years as she explores her growing independence. It's admirable and frustrating.

I could see L doing it.

But instead, we see another form of independence: the understanding that adults can ask for help. The understanding that asking for help does not suggest dependence.

"We are a family that has three bowls of dried ice cream and a plate of crusty scrambled eggs in a room we're not even supposed to have food in." It's a sentence