And somehow that ordinary request helped everyone breathe again.
Over the next couple of days, our family’s language changed.
We stopped saying things like good number and bad number.
We learned to say high or low.
We learned that food wasn’t a moral problem.
We learned that diabetes wasn’t caused by Finn eating too much sugar, and it wasn’t a punishment for anything Lydia or Shane had done.
We learned how much preparation could fit into ordinary life without letting the preparation become the whole life.
Most importantly, Finn began to look like Finn again.
His energy returned gradually.
His face looked less drawn.
He started complaining about being bored.
That was the first complaint everyone welcomed.
By then, the beach felt like it belonged to another vacation entirely.
We never went back as one big group.
Nobody cared.
The younger kids still collected shells with my parents near the rental house. Shane’s daughter made Finn a crooked paper sign for his room. My dad kept offering to drive anywhere anyone needed to go, because driving was the only useful thing he could think of doing.
