rob.nester

Unlike last Thanksgiving, I was able to go visit my parents and brother this year. The trip home was something that I was looking forward to since it had been a while since I had been home. With thoughts about how nice it would be to stay up all nice hanging out with my dad while smoking turkeys (no, that's not some sort of code, it's in reference to a way of cooking a turkey, and it's delicious).

Ya know that whole cliché about how you can't go home again? I think whoever came up with that was spot on. I mean, I was home, but it felt foreign. My parents still love me, that's something I don't doubt, but still, it was just kind of surreal.

I think it was compounded by my brother. As of late he's been having more violent fits, and I know it's weighing heavily on my parents.

As if that wasn't enough, the day before Thanksgiving brought news that my grandmother was being hospitalized, yet again, for a blood transfusion. Apparently where other people's bodies recycle their blood, my grandmother's body just loses it. So eventually she has to be hospitalized and transfused with blood. The net result is a few more month of (continually declining quality) of life. It also results in my father spending every evening going to see her. It's not that this is a bad thing, it's a noble thing to be honest. The problem is that it's yet another in a series of weights my parents have shouldered.