Bringing the family

A few weeks ago, we were sit­ting at the din­ing table hav­ing din­ner. All was usual. Mum was grip­ing about every­thing. Sis was com­plain­ing about some­thing at work. Brother-in-law was ask­ing me some inane ques­tion in an effort to drum up con­ver­sa­tion with me. Brother was silent. And lit­tle Josh was try­ing to get everyone’s attention.

We dished the food onto our plates of rice as per normal.

Then it was Dad’s turn to scoop some stuff onto his plate. I stopped the spin­ning lazy susan to help him. And that’s when I saw it.

He picked up the serv­ing spoon in the most laboured man­ner, his right hand trem­bling quite sig­nif­i­cantly. Parkinson’s. My first thought flashed. Then I was mes­merised. I looked at him eat­ing for the rest of dinner.

He did com­plain to me about hav­ing the shakes. He usu­ally doesn’t com­plain much unless he’s afraid. But I think he was aware that I was aware and observ­ing him.

I met him in his office yes­ter­day for a busi­ness chat, and he was shak­ing so much that I lost my train of thought. He was aware of it, and hid his hands behind his back.

Last night, Mum told me she got a num­ber for a neu­rol­o­gist, and asked me to make an appoint­ment for Dad.

At din­ner tonight, I asked him when I could make an appoint­ment, and he was quite annoyed. “I have so many med­ical appoint­ments. I go to my car­di­ol­o­gist first and do all my tests first”.

“They have med­i­cines that can con­trol the shak­ing you know?”, was my counter. He kept quiet and tried to dish some more food on his plate, and gave up after one try.