My Dad Makes Me Smile
I just returned from a vacation to the Bahamas with my family. I mean my whole family. Dad, Mom, husband, sister, stepsister, brother-in-law and my sweet niece and nephew. We had a great time and my husband has been working every night since our return making a dvd incorporating all of our pictures and movie-lets. As I'm watching this footage my heart is warmed. Of course my niece and nephew are hilarious, and there is the usual mugging done in steady rotation by myself, my sister et al; but what makes me smile the most is watching my dad.
He wouldn't want me to tell you how old he is, but he's old enough to have had me who is 36 and my sister who is 38. He would however, want me to tell you how young he looks for his age. In fact, if you know him at all, you've certainly had the pleasure of him regaling you with the story of when he took my sister to the Father/Daughter dance and nobody believed that her "date" was actually her dad. They really didn't. He has always looked that great.
Dad's always been dramatic too. He is like the father in a Christmas Story with the unusual cussword combinations he can come up with at a moment's notice. I remember one afternoon we girls were playing some game of grab-ass and cutting up in the living room while dad was having a bowl of hot soup. He was seated at the end of the dining room table, which had a drop leaf at either end of it. He hollered a few times for us to settle down, and when we didn't he got up to go make sure we heard him. Only in doing so his legs bumped into the drop leaf. His instinct was to sit back down and swivel out from under it; but that released the drop leaf, thereby dumping all of his soup onto his lap. I believe "JESUS F#%K!" was his interjection on that one, and we scattered like roaches.
My dad is also hilarious, sometimes without trying. Example being the time he and I found ourselves "trapped' in my apartment elevator for all of three minutes back in 1995. He had come over to connect the television to the entertainment center so that we could have our annual Oscar night party in stereo! He had arrived armed with the proper wiring; or so he thought. "This is the one" he'd say as he attached the wire, then realized it was not, and headed out the door. He had to make not one, not two, not even just three, but several trips to Radio Shack to try again and again.
When dad was all finished, I got into the elevator with him to walk him to his car. We were giggling about what a bear of a job that turned out to be as the elevator doors shut. We kept talking for a few seconds before realizing that we were no longer moving but the doors hadn't opened. I looked at the doors, the buttons overhead, the side button panel, then back at dad; and when I did, I saw the color leave his face. By that I mean not so much slowly drain, as quite literally disappear in an instant. His lips fell to a lower location on his face as if the muscles inside his cheeks had been cut. Beads of sweat popped up like wild mushrooms in a time lapse film, and he started pulling at the buttons on his shirt while puffing air wildly out of his mouth.
I hardly had a second to tell him to calm down when he crouched down and darted his eyes up toward the 2 foot by 2 foot sealed opening in the ceiling. His eyebrows quivered as he started in a low voice which built in to a downright scream of "That space is too small for ANYTHING TO GET OUT!" He spun around and started pounding on the emergency call button with one hand while fluttering his shirt back and forth with the other.
Someone arrived outside the elevator in a flash and called a directive into us through the closed doors. Whatever the guy said required a response. Dad turned to me and whispered "What did he say." I knew right away why he was whispering, and when I asked him after this whole ordeal was over if I was right he said "how did you know?"
The reason my big 6 foot 3 father was crouching and whispering to me was because he didn't want to use up whatever oxygen was in this elevator with unnecessary chatter. I'm not kidding.
He stood in the corner shaking and pulling at his sweaty shirt, blowing quick spastic breaths out of a puckered mouth while I followed the directions that the man on the outside shouted at me. I parted the doors, and when they opened I saw that we were between floors and there was a good 3 foot drop down to the ground of the second floor landing of my apartment building. I started to go toward the opening to suss out the distance, when suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder shoving me out of the way. I stumbled to the side as my father threw himself out of the elevator and landed in a heap on the hallway floor. Again, this ordeal lasted three minutes tops.
My father is precious. He's become a doting grandfather who started a Disney video collection even before any of us even thought about trying to provide him with grandchildren. He hosts Summertime Wednesdays at Grandpa's so that he can swim with the grandkids and fix them dinner (then let them pick a video to watch in special little chairs he's bought them next to an ever-growing basket of toys he has handy for them).
Dad's earned his retirement and spends his time fixing up his house, taking pictures of his cats, organizing pictures of the family on the computer, cooking for my stepmom, shopping for the grandkids and planning trips.
Yes, dad likes to gamble (responsibly) and he likes to hit some type of hotel or resort that has a casino either onsite or within short driving distance once every month or so. He has also begun a yearly tradition of the family vacation. So far we've hit Paradise Point in San Diego, gone camping in Ventura, and as I mentioned earlier, he just styled us with an extravagant Thanksgiving trip to the Bahamas.
I have a father who cusses like a sailor. Freaks out in elevators. Loves his grandchildren. And spoils us all like today were his last day on earth.
I sure am lucky, and I know it.
He wouldn't want me to tell you how old he is, but he's old enough to have had me who is 36 and my sister who is 38. He would however, want me to tell you how young he looks for his age. In fact, if you know him at all, you've certainly had the pleasure of him regaling you with the story of when he took my sister to the Father/Daughter dance and nobody believed that her "date" was actually her dad. They really didn't. He has always looked that great.
Dad's always been dramatic too. He is like the father in a Christmas Story with the unusual cussword combinations he can come up with at a moment's notice. I remember one afternoon we girls were playing some game of grab-ass and cutting up in the living room while dad was having a bowl of hot soup. He was seated at the end of the dining room table, which had a drop leaf at either end of it. He hollered a few times for us to settle down, and when we didn't he got up to go make sure we heard him. Only in doing so his legs bumped into the drop leaf. His instinct was to sit back down and swivel out from under it; but that released the drop leaf, thereby dumping all of his soup onto his lap. I believe "JESUS F#%K!" was his interjection on that one, and we scattered like roaches.
My dad is also hilarious, sometimes without trying. Example being the time he and I found ourselves "trapped' in my apartment elevator for all of three minutes back in 1995. He had come over to connect the television to the entertainment center so that we could have our annual Oscar night party in stereo! He had arrived armed with the proper wiring; or so he thought. "This is the one" he'd say as he attached the wire, then realized it was not, and headed out the door. He had to make not one, not two, not even just three, but several trips to Radio Shack to try again and again.
When dad was all finished, I got into the elevator with him to walk him to his car. We were giggling about what a bear of a job that turned out to be as the elevator doors shut. We kept talking for a few seconds before realizing that we were no longer moving but the doors hadn't opened. I looked at the doors, the buttons overhead, the side button panel, then back at dad; and when I did, I saw the color leave his face. By that I mean not so much slowly drain, as quite literally disappear in an instant. His lips fell to a lower location on his face as if the muscles inside his cheeks had been cut. Beads of sweat popped up like wild mushrooms in a time lapse film, and he started pulling at the buttons on his shirt while puffing air wildly out of his mouth.
I hardly had a second to tell him to calm down when he crouched down and darted his eyes up toward the 2 foot by 2 foot sealed opening in the ceiling. His eyebrows quivered as he started in a low voice which built in to a downright scream of "That space is too small for ANYTHING TO GET OUT!" He spun around and started pounding on the emergency call button with one hand while fluttering his shirt back and forth with the other.
Someone arrived outside the elevator in a flash and called a directive into us through the closed doors. Whatever the guy said required a response. Dad turned to me and whispered "What did he say." I knew right away why he was whispering, and when I asked him after this whole ordeal was over if I was right he said "how did you know?"
The reason my big 6 foot 3 father was crouching and whispering to me was because he didn't want to use up whatever oxygen was in this elevator with unnecessary chatter. I'm not kidding.
He stood in the corner shaking and pulling at his sweaty shirt, blowing quick spastic breaths out of a puckered mouth while I followed the directions that the man on the outside shouted at me. I parted the doors, and when they opened I saw that we were between floors and there was a good 3 foot drop down to the ground of the second floor landing of my apartment building. I started to go toward the opening to suss out the distance, when suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder shoving me out of the way. I stumbled to the side as my father threw himself out of the elevator and landed in a heap on the hallway floor. Again, this ordeal lasted three minutes tops.
My father is precious. He's become a doting grandfather who started a Disney video collection even before any of us even thought about trying to provide him with grandchildren. He hosts Summertime Wednesdays at Grandpa's so that he can swim with the grandkids and fix them dinner (then let them pick a video to watch in special little chairs he's bought them next to an ever-growing basket of toys he has handy for them).
Dad's earned his retirement and spends his time fixing up his house, taking pictures of his cats, organizing pictures of the family on the computer, cooking for my stepmom, shopping for the grandkids and planning trips.
Yes, dad likes to gamble (responsibly) and he likes to hit some type of hotel or resort that has a casino either onsite or within short driving distance once every month or so. He has also begun a yearly tradition of the family vacation. So far we've hit Paradise Point in San Diego, gone camping in Ventura, and as I mentioned earlier, he just styled us with an extravagant Thanksgiving trip to the Bahamas.
I have a father who cusses like a sailor. Freaks out in elevators. Loves his grandchildren. And spoils us all like today were his last day on earth.
I sure am lucky, and I know it.
posted by MimiLolly at 3:10 PM
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