Family Dinner Night:

By Thio Isobel Moss

I have a new video on my phone of my brother riding a lawnmower with a child seated on his knee, while chasing after another child.

This came about at our weekly family dinner night, which Oz and my sister-in-law, Kendi, host. “Family,” in this case, is meant literally and honorarily. Can you believe that’s a word? I wasn’t certain until spellcheck failed to flag it.

Anyhoo, family dinner night is a tradition that started after Oz’s best friend, Ty, passed away last year. Ty was very involved in the lives of a couple of cousins, one of whom has two children, ages eight and nine now…I think. My deep-feeling brother needed some way to honor his friend, and family dinner night was soon born.

It has been a tremendous success, which surprised me. I always think I love children; I do, but I get overstimulated very easily. Noise, motion, light…alas, they are not my friends. However, for three hours every week, it’s not been a problem. They are noisy. They treat the house as a jungle gym, flying up and down stairs at lightning speed. I cringe every time, certain someone’s about to get a concussion.

But they’re also adorable, hilarious, curious, intelligent, so very certain of things, and polite. Somehow, and I don’t think it was suggested to them, we’ve arrived at a point where the kids clear the table.

My education has expanded greatly under their tutelage. Apparently, as humans mature, their tails grow in. The little girl, Selene, for the purposes of this post, asked what mine looked like. I told her it was a fluffy ringtail. There was a long discussion on the topic with every adult describing their tail in some detail.

Last week, the evening ended outside, as the weather was lovely. After playing with a football for a bit, Selene informed Oz that he needed to mow the grass. This was, indeed, true, and he quickly determined that it might entertain the kids, as they had tired of the football. He was correct.

Some alterations in where cars were parked took place, and soon he was buzzing around the side of the house. The kids are good about taking turns and appeared quite as happy to run ahead of the mower, looking back to make sure they were in mortal peril…or felt like it.

This reminded me of when I was four years old, and my dad gave me my first motorcycle ride. We lived at the very base of a valley in a neighborhood with a lot of children. I don’t remember how it happened, but one day Dad was suckered into giving all of us a ride, off-road, around the house.

I am, by nature, an anxious person, yet I have never been afraid on a motorcycle. Even after my dad tipped us over once in our own driveway when I was a teen. I managed to leap to safety, and somehow, he survived unscathed, as well.

Memories are funny things.

For Selene and her brother, they no longer remember a time when we didn’t all have dinner at my brother’s once a week. They remember Ty, but not the lack of meals served in that previous life. It makes me wonder what these two will remember years from now.

Oz has become some sort of hybrid relative—not quite an uncle or grandfather, but the way they climb all over him is beautiful.

After the horror of last year, when Ty was rear-ended by a drunk driver as he was turning into work, I worried for Oz. This was the second close-as-brothers friend he’d lost in a tragic way, but in trying to honor Ty, he found a balm for all of us.

Isn’t it interesting how often, when we pay tribute to those who have shaped us that small sacrifice of time and effort is returned tenfold. In honoring Ty, our family grew.