An Easy Day

I have started practicing gratitude ahead of time —

thanking God for things I hope will happen.

So this morning I thanked Him for my dad having a good day.

An easy day.

An easy day does not mean he feels good.

It means the world behaves.

He keeps a notebook now.

When I come over, he writes it down.

When I leave, he writes it down.

Appointments go in it — what happened and what was said.

Phone calls go in it — who he spoke to and about what.

Instructions for the day, from me, go in it.

What he ate — when he ate.

Roscoe’s bathroom times — all recorded.

The notebook is the authority.

When I ask if he is hungry, he does not check his body.

He asks, “What time is it?”

Then he walks to the notebook.

He reads what he last ate and when.

The notebook tells him if he is hungry.

He will open it and read it carefully, trusting the handwriting more than his own thoughts — sometimes.

But the world and the notebook do not always agree.

Trash goes out Tuesday night for Wednesday pickup.

Right side of the driveway.

He knows this.

He reads it.

He closes the notebook.

Five minutes later the question returns — not as forgetfulness, but as doubt.

Did I do it?

Did I forget?

Did I mess something up?

He walks to the garage.

The trash can is there.

Relief.

He sits down.

Ten minutes later the doubt returns.

He walks outside and checks the driveway to see if it’s already out.

It isn’t.

Back to the garage.

Back to the driveway.

Back to the notebook.

A text appears on my phone.

Steph — trash goes out on the right side of the driveway?

I answer yes.

Ten minutes later he checks again.

All day.

Not because he cannot think.

Because he cannot trust what his mind tells him happened.

Imagine opening the blinds in the morning and remembering clearly closing them the night before.

You are certain.

But they are open.

You stand there trying to locate the missing moment — the action you must have taken — and your brain begins reconstructing events you cannot access.

The intellect is still there.

Working perfectly.

It is just working with disappearing evidence.

So it compensates.

Checking light.

Checking objects.

Checking clocks.

Checking notes.

Not trying to remember —

trying to stabilize reality.

Is it morning or night right now?

Every object becomes a clue.

Every silence becomes a question.

So when I say an easy day, I do not mean nothing happened.

I mean nothing frightened him.

No quiet panic behind his eyes.

No searching the room for confirmation.

No mind running all day trying to solve an unsolvable puzzle.

An easy day is a day his brain rests.

And mine rests too.

Tonight I will thank God again.

Not because I know what kind of day tomorrow will be.

Because I don’t.

I am thanking Him ahead of time —

hoping for a day where the world stays where my dad left it long enough for him to live inside it.

An easy day.