Thursday, November 03, 2005

Just One Look

Do you have someone that you can communicate with just with facial movements? I was reminded of this the other day when visiting my brother. Matthew is almost 3 years younger than I am and is a successful loan officer. I stopped in to see him at work (I wanted to fax something and brought him a few burritos for lunch... it's just blocks from my house.) He is used to clients who are always stressed about getting in under deadlines prior to rate increases and are on edge about getting the loan. So I'm sitting in his office and someone calls about a upcoming conference. The "uh-huh," "I see" and "get it over with" looks were on his face. That is when we looked at each other. For some reason, just looking at Matt at the wrong time will cause us both to break into uncontrollable laughter.

I specifically remember sitting in our seats at St. Frances DeSales when we were kids. It was time for sacrament. I was sitting with my brother and sister to the left of my mother with my father on the far right. The chaplain raised his something in his hand (a cracker) and said "This is my body. Eat from it and..." That was about the time that I was looking at my brother and we started giggling. My father looked tersely at us and then came the raising of the cup, "This is blood. Drink from it and..." That was when we both lost it. I don't think that my father's arm could triple in length but at that moment it did as he smacked both of us in the back of the head. Dad stood up and dragged Matt to his right to keep him out of my view and the rest of the service was pretty silent.

I think back about that right now and I wonder. How often have you had a weird connection with a family member that you couldn't explain?

6 comments:

Fred said...

Great question. Uncle Bill and I never said much to each other, but I always felt as thought I was more in touch with him than most of my other relatives.

He smoked too much, drank too much, and ultimately died too early at age 59. But, we always made eye contact, nodded as thought we knew what the other thought, then moved on.

He was a great guy. I miss him.

BeckEye said...

Well, my brother Joe flipped out once when we were playing Celebrity Taboo one Christmas. My sister and I were a team and we practically only had to say one word to each other (usually a line from said celebrity's movies or something) before we got the answer. We were killing. I think he was especially pissed because his wife knows NOTHING about pop culture and they were losing big time. He finally snapped and was like, "What the HELL! You guys have some sort of secret language or something!!" Ah, get together games. Gotta love 'em.

By the way, regarding your comment on my blog...the Eddie Murphy undercover skit was the first thing that came to my mind too! I love the bank scene. "What a silly Negro". That was one of the funniest things he ever did there.

Jenn Doll said...

Hmm, the one time I can remember is actually a sad time and this is more of a fun post, so I'll leave it be.

Right now, everyone thinks that my boyfriend and I are "weird." We do and say the same things at the same time and we always think what the other is thinking so the looks just add to it.

I love it when just looking at someone makes you laugh uncontrolably. It's especially great that you guys still do that!

Anonymous said...

I have three friends I've known for goin on 30 years now. We were in the first grade together. We talk to each other nearly everyday, our kids play together, holidays and birthdays are 'family' get togethers with these friends. You can't be friends with someone for that long and not know exactly what they're thinkin..lol. Which is sometimes rather scary. But I wouldn't have it any other way :)

Julia Reffner said...

My Brothers and I are all like that. It used to get us into trouble as kids as we would use eachother to help fabricate tales of what had really happened to the Bathroom door that now lay in pieces. All we needed was to be able to see the other one and we could make our stories match up.

The Lumpy

Lily said...

yes, I have a couple of friends that I'm like that with. You can say so much with just body language.