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Kind things to do for your parents and relatives

For the family you did not choose and mostly see on fixed dates. A lot of these are about asking something while asking is still an ordinary conversation rather than an urgent one.

4 ideas

• Ask now what they would want

  Where they want to be, who decides, what they would refuse. Asked over tea it is a conversation. Asked in a corridor it is a crisis.

  Half an hourFreeA relative

• Turn up when there is no occasion

  Birthdays and Christmas are obligations. A Tuesday is a choice, and everybody can tell the difference.

  An afternoonFreeA relative

• Deal with the thing they keep meaning to deal with

  The cupboard door, the unopened letter, the tap. It has been on their list for two years and it is forty minutes of yours.

  An afternoonUnder $10A relative

• Write down how their house actually works

  Which tap drips, where the stopcock is, who fixes the boiler. One page, on the fridge, for whoever needs it next.

  Half an hourFreeA relative