And Then He Came Back

My dad is notorious for showing up at our house on either a Friday or a Saturday night at around 9pm.

Granted, this is better than him coming over at that time on a Tuesday. I can’t say I’d be able to be civil if he did that. Ahem.

**Tangent because I can’t help it: There is this radio host in our area (She co-hosts a morning show on a Fort Wayne radio station.) who, instead of saying ‘granted’ in the context that I used above, says “Granite.” As in the stone that is often used for countertops. Not as in, “I grant you this caveat.” Which is why GRANTED is the correct word in this situation. No, Nichole uses GRANITE, as in, I wish my house had come with granite countertops. But instead, she’ll say something like, “Granite, it’s better that he comes on a Friday or Saturday than a Tuesday.” Which, I think we can all agree, is WRONG. To be fair to this stupid radio ‘talent’ her male co-host is equally moronic. He almost always uses ‘I’ instead of ‘me’ even when ‘ME’ is grammatically correct, which irritates me to no end, as shown in more than one post right here on this very blog. I think he’d even been known to use the ever-dreaded possessive I as in, “It’s my wife and I’s anniversary.” *shudder* Like I said, Andy’s a moron too. Why yes, I do 'hate listen' to them. It amuses me even as it infuriates me. I'm a tangled web of contradictions. End Tangent.**

So yes, one recent Saturday, my dad pulled into my driveway at 9:05. He came to the door as I bitched and moaned to an amused Olivia about the rudeness of the whole situation.

He rang the doorbell twice (because once isn’t enough, obviously) and when I answered the door, trying not to be as grumpy as I felt, he asked me if I’d call my sister and ask her if his phone was at her house.

I did.

It was.

After I’d made the call, he made an off-hand comment that A receiving a call from me that late in the evening might make her think Dad had had car trouble. Ha. Hahaha, funny joke, that. (Dear Reader: this is called fore-shadowing.)

He only stayed a few more minutes because I think he really wanted to get back and get his phone. Who knows if he planned to drive off again once he had his phone. He’s a nocturnal dude. He likes to drive at night. I know. I think it’s weird too.

So he left, saying something about going to his niece’s (okay, she’s the widow of one of his nephews but still…) house before he went home and how he’d call her if he had his phone blah blah blah.

The girls and I settled back into watching “Making a Model with Yolanda Hadid.” What?

At 10:15, about an hour after my dad left, I saw lights in the driveway. I said aloud, “Who’s here?”

Alyssa and I twitched at the curtains, trying to figure out who was in the driveway. It was a truck that parked right at the end.

We made sure all the doors were locked and continued to lurk at the windows. We’re weird like that.

We have motion activated outside lights. As my dad walked up the front porch steps, his face was illuminated.

I was opening the front door before he could ring the doorbell. The truck that had dropped him off was already backing out of the driveway.

Walking in the door, my dad announced morosely, “I had a flat tire.”

Tom asked if he needed help changing the tire.

My dad didn’t have a spare tire in the truck he was driving. It was parked in the parking lot of the fast food restaurant where Alyssa works. He’d gotten a ride from a tow truck driver at the service station attached to the restaurant.

He used my phone to call my sister, who lived about 40 miles from where I live.

He hung up and handed me my phone, telling me that my sister was going to come get him.

I told him I could take him home or he could stay the night and we could get him back to her house in the morning.

We decided that I’d take him back. It was going to be the same amount of driving no matter who was driving. Either I’d drive him there and then go home or she’d drive to my house and then take him back to hers.

I changed into real pants and kissed my husband and daughters goodbye.

My dad asked if we could stop where his truck was parked on its flat tire so he could get some things out of it to take home with him.

We did. It wasn’t like we had to go out of our way to do that but even if it had been out of the way I’d have taken him there because, damn it, I can pretend to be a kind and loving daughter just as easily as I can pretend to be a kind and loving mother.

This might be a good time to mention that it was raining…hard. And, better still, I had never been to my sister’s house. I had no idea where she lived other than it was west of Angola, near a lake.

Reminder, I live in Ohio, which is east of Angola.

So we drove toward Angola. I watched my car monitor the outside temperature. It was 33 degrees; just above freezing.

Once we were in Angola, I asked my dad where we were going.

He instructed me to head for Crooked Lake.

Once we were on 200W, I asked him where to next.

He pointed left and said, “Turn here.”

“Here?” I said, not seeing anywhere to turn. It was dark, there wasn’t a turn lane and honestly, I couldn’t even see a freaking road.

He pointed to a building with several outside lights. “There’s a road there.”

I finally saw the turn lane and figured out what road he was talking about.

I turned.

We drove some more. The rain kept falling, the temperature dropped to 32 degrees. Sigh.

My dad is TERRIBLE at giving directions. He never once gave me any sort of warning before just announcing, “Turn here.”

Where? Here? It was dark and it was raining. And I was beginning to worry that the rain was about to turn to ice (spoiler alert, it didn’t.)

I finally got him to my sister’s house. He asked me if I’d be able to find my way back.

I would.

I did.

I also waited to make sure he’d make it inside my sister’s house because, see above about being a kind and loving daughter.

When I got home, Alyssa was in bed, Tom was asleep on the couch in the family room and Olivia was waiting up for me in the living room. She was SO tired.

Alyssa told me the next day that she’d tried to get Olivia to go up to bed when she, Alyssa, did. But Liv insisted on waiting for me.

She’s got the kind, loving daughter thing down pat.

I’m pretty sure my dad was glad to be reunited with his phone.

How did we all survive before cell phones?