Most of my conversations with my twin brother start and end this way.
My twin brother is my best friend, I can't imagine life without him in it.
We have gone through seasons where we were apart from one another.
I was in Georgia for a little bit.
He was in Dallas for a longer bit.
He was back and forth from Edmonton.
I was in Sherwood Park.
I was in Lac La biche.
But we are both in Calgary now.
We have gone stretches where we haven't spoke to one another.
But we always pick up where we left off.
I don't know if it's a "twin thing" because I've never not been a twin.
And I don't want to.
Not be a twin that is.
As I'm writing, I'm thinking of a song that reminds me of my brother, I think it's title is "open windows" by the punk band "Face to Face" and do you think I can find it on YouTube? No. All I get is Windows OS crap... or a dog riding in a convertible.
My brother and I have been through a whole lot of life together; most recently we were both laid off and sent into the limbo hell of job hunting. People say that Alberta is paradise and unemployment is near zero, anyone who wants to work is work, that is people with jobs are saying this, I personally know a number of skilled, experienced and educated people who would strongly disagree with such a Pollyanna statement.
Working two highly part time jobs (10 hrs per week between both) and collecting a portion of my past EI contributions is tight... really tight. Like an old bottle of nail-polish tight.... I have three daughters, one of my designated "daddy jobs" is to open the multitude of cemented shut nail-polish bottles. Money is tight, and with that my brother is left wanting for the 2014 rendition of the Calgary Comic Expo, he's actually been left wanting for the Calgary Comic Expo for a few years now, which is criminal for someone of his comic-geek passion.
My empty recyclable drinking container collection suddenly started to look like a Calgary Comic Expo ticket, so after some selfies with my empties I took a little trip, or two and found myself with a ticket for my super cool bro. Ok, I was kidding about the selfies, but it is going to be fun to know my bro is taking in an annual pilgrimage he has been shut out of for far too long.
So that's number 9 but it's also a RAK for me, a big RAK for me.
Number 10 turned up a the library with my bro.
We had scoured the stacks from some sweet finds and I nabbed a copy of MacWorld and a little book on Google ad words and as I bellied up to the self-checkout I noticed the woman who had just walked away had forgotten her card in the machine. With my Spidey-sense tingling RAK I grabbed the card and ran after the woman and her daughter, and if you know me, you know I don't run unless I'm being chased... or chasing, it's really for the best, nobody wants to see me run. "Excuse me, you left your library card" the woman turned with a puzzled look and then smiled and thanked me after taking her card. As a Calgary Public Library power user, I know the pain of having lost your card, you tear the house apart, APART, looking for it, you even clean the car and finally go into the library to ask if you left it there. It's not a fun experience. Kind of like when you don't know where you left your phone and you continually call it, running room to room with your head cocked at and odd angle as if you're tuning in rabbit ears to the sound of your phone vibrating or ringtone - of you're lucky, but really, you're not that lucky.
So there you are.
9 and 10.
And I find that my typically cynical heart has started to turn into something different. Don't get me wrong, I'm still a curmudgeon of a muppet, but I'm inching towards the light.
So if you're reading this, and haven't fallen asleep yet, consider making tiny changes in your life and letting people go ahead of you at the store or in traffic, asking a co-worker if they want a coffee top-up when you make your way to the caffeine shrine or not getting your loonie back when you put the shopping cart back. A single small rock isn't much, but stack enough of them together and you can build a castle. Go and build a kingdom with your Random Acts of Kindness.
No comments:
Post a Comment