On Thursday we had the local family over for Thanksgiving dinner. My daughter’s family joined my mother at our house. Being 90, and a bit “kooky”, we are never quite certain what my mother might talk about. She began by saying that she had lost a button from the cuff of her fancy jumpsuit. We all know how much she loves her jumpsuits, so we treated this news with the appropriate level of dismay and concern.

As the day went on Baba brought up any number of topics, to discuss. She was sad that the poinsettia plant with variegated leaves didn’t turn out to be the “conversation piece” that she had hoped for. We had to inform her that we don’t talk politics at the Thanksgiving table. She thought we were being silly. She also got perturbed when I told her that we weren’t interested in discussing the particulars of a recent fatal hit and run accident in town. She honestly thought that we were picking on her.

After dinner, Bev and I were called away to help with a situation across town. We both needed to leave and we couldn’t say much about why, but our family is used to such things occurring and didn’t really worry too much about it. I was worried about not being around to act as a buffer for Baba’s special brand of company, decided to let everyone act as adults and hopefully there would be no dust ups.

On our way home I texted to let them know we were on our way. My daughter told me that Baba had gone home. She then told me that her husband had found Baba’s button. Uh oh…that didn’t sound good. She is normally pretty ok with my son-in-law, but maybe being left on her own was just too much to take and Chad’s innocent remark got blown out of proportion.

As it turns out, Kristen was being completely literal: Chad had found the missing button from the jumpsuit! Crisis averted.

We never know how things will work out. It can be easy to misinterpret even the most basic of information. This recovery thing can be tough even when it’s easy. So sit back, take a breath, and…

–Rise Up!!