My father showed up over an hour late and didn’t say hello to my mom. He didn’t want to eat with us so I went and grabbed food and mom ate in the other room and Bear in his office. These rooms are all mostly open to each other, so we could all hear and partially see each other. My dad and I were sitting at the table in the middle while I ate. We were talking about his trip to Peru and knitting and fiber arts and culture. We were stilted and awkward the way you can only get with family that you are estranged from. Then my father gets ridiculous:

“So are you planning on knitting any little things?”

“Little? Like what?”

He gives me this funny look like I’ve spoiled his joke. “Like booties”

I burst in laughter. “Very subtle dad.”

He leaves shortly after that. I swear Bear and I are half convinced he came only to make sure he hadn’t become a grandfather and didn’t let us know. I kinda wonder if every two years he’s going to check back and keep making sure. Funny that he doesn’t realize I would actually make the effort to let him know.

(Linda, title is from Die Alone by Ingrid Michaelson. This blog and the song and freaking everything keeps linking back to the anon doc’s blog post.)