Mark Silha in the House!

 

Our various adventures in these “interesting” times have rather suddenly evolved livelier with the arrival of Brother Mark Silha for a five week visit!

The family decided it would be better if he were not living in lock-down at his group home, where his situation is not stimulating enough even when he can go to work his several part-time jobs & other activities at his provider program “Choice”. Sister Alice & Bro-in-love John very generously brought him to live with them 7 weeks ago. They need a break, so we are very happy to have him in turn!

He has visited Soundcliff each summer for 10 days or so around the camp he attends here on Vashon, where we had been councilors for years. We spend other weeks with him during our visits to Minneapolis or vacation time in Florida, but this rather longer period of day-to-day living will give us a generous opportunity to really get to know him — & ourselves!

He & I are fellow Leos, having birthdays that are one day apart & over these 25 years, we have developed a very special bond as Brothers-in-Love.

He deeply appreciates & loves music, particularly the songsters of the 40s through the 70s, plus many of the Broadway show tunes… music his parents played. He has a remarkable memory & knows the names of many of the composers of the great American songbook & other arcane facts he has gleaned from reading the liner notes of the albums he has played for decades as LPs & CDs… . He loves to dance! He doesn’t like opera, nor most classical music, altho we sneak a bit of education into that variety now & again.

He likes regularity & schedule, yet he is also easy-going is certainly fun loving. He Can easily embrace spontaneous adventure which might suppose to upset those professed preferences.

He/we always want to have a puzzle going, inviting us into the concentration of those times which can prove illuminating for entering & sharing another of his worlds. His visually spatial capability for shape & color. This one proves his diligence… & patience… which he certainly can lose, if most often only for moments.

 He plays one deliciously mean game of cards! Kings On The Corner has been his game of choice for a decade. His mind does numbers much better than words!

Yet he has his own very good conversational skills, if not particularly broad in range. He holds his own in social settings… loving parties. Facile at meeting people, He can effectively work a room…

The mix in which we live with him is rich in wonder & frustration… I want to dive deeper into that richness while studying the patience required to assist him to live in our less appreciative world.

He is the senior employee at the McDonald’s where he has become a signature greeter. He commutes alone via city bus. His other jobs involve cleaning yoga mats at two fitness clubs & general cleaning at a fire station.

Alice & John took-on his eating disorder, helping him lose 20 pounds. Thus then we two old understudies of gluttony for fresh healthy richness have been given the creative mandate of portion control. We anticipate it might be good for us as well.

Obviously there will be more to this story!