Kitchen Gnomes + Roommates

Tonight I found the coffee scoop that went missing from the kitchen weeks ago. I blamed the kitchen gnomes, but truthfully, I lost it down the sink and then forgot. As I fished it out triumphantly, Joel yelled from the couch, “I should keep a journal of all the ridiculous stuff that has happened since you’ve been living here!”(Really, Dad, he said “stuff”)

Joel and I are alike in a lot of ways. We’re both introverted and too intuitive; we like to watch documentaries, listen to public radio and leave dishes in the sink for days. But he is practical, precise and incredibly detail oriented. He just shakes his head when I use his “beer glasses meant for pouring Belgian beer” to drink almond milk, set off the fire alarm cooking at 10 pm, dry the laundry on high heat and (most grievously of all) load the dishwasher inefficiently. Still, he is still pretty patient as I’ve bleached his towels, dumped coffee beans into the couch cushions and nurtured an entire colony of fruit flies in the kitchen.

It is somewhat rare for two adult siblings to live together and a lot of people assume we’re a couple. Talk about awkward. Standard introduction: “Hi I’m Hannah, this is Joelheismybrother.” He says I kill his vibe with the ladies. I would like to point out that is a two-way street.  

It’s been really great having my brother as a roommate though. Not only is it nice to have a roommate after living alone for 6 months in DC (and one that shares my love of bacon and Star Trek!), but connecting with him as adults without the elements of parents, home or the other siblings has been good.
 

Joel moved out when I was 13 and has done dozens different things all over the country and the world in the last 10 years. He’s always been the trail-breaker in our family, encouraging the rest of us to break rules and question norms. The image of him as the sometimes-troublemaker-but-really-cool big brother lingered for years; conversely, I was the excruciatingly annoying pre-teen little sister. Joel never takes the easiest path and I always looked up to that.  True story: The essay prompt in one of my standardized tests in 9th grade was to write about a hero of mine—I wrote about Joel.

Now that we have both settled more into our identities, his personality challenges me to question why I think the way I do, believe what I do and act certain ways. It can frustrate me since I am still more of a black-and-white thinker and don’t like lingering dissonance in my thinking, but I value highly the challenges he presents. He has encouraged me to communicate more honestly, to value people where they are and look for the hope in every situation. These are all good things.

I am grateful to live in Oregon these months before Kenya, and connecting with Joel is definitely one of the reasons why.

I may never be able to park his truck straight and we'll always have to agree to disagree on the Bourne trilogy, but I’ll always have some invaluable memories with family.

Come on, people, we are *clearly* related!