For one reason or another, the whole family was there visiting, and instead of looking to our Mom to cook dinner for all of us, we thought it would be nice to take our parents out for a nice dinner at a nice restaurant. I suggested a world-famous restaurant--McDonald's--but for some reason I was voted down.
My Dad wasn't as old then (if that's not stating the obvious), but he was every bit as cantankerous.
"Dad," I told him. "Get ready. We're taking you and Mom out to eat."
We had already passed the idea by Mom, and she was all for it. She's spent her whole life cooking three meals a day plus snacks, so any opportunity to get out of the kitchen and have somebody cater to her was her idea of a good time. My Dad, however...
"Out to eat?" he asked.
"Yeah, Dad." I answered. "Out to eat."
"But your mother is going to cook."
"For ALL of us?"
"Yeah."
That was easy for him to say.
"We thought it would be nice to take the two of you out," I told him.
"Who's we?"
"All of us."
"But your mother likes to cook."
Like I said, it was easy for my Dad to say that, especially since his part in the equation consisted of waiting for the food to be cooked.
"We already told her," I said, "and she thinks it's a great idea."
"She does, eh?"
"Yeah, she does."
"So she's not going to cook?"
"No."
My Dad pondered that a bit. And stayed where he sat. Watching TV. Not that he had any getting ready to do. He was dressed. His shoes were on. All he really had to do was stand up and turn off the television set. I only told him to get ready to get him used to the idea of eventually having to get up and turning off the television set. Half the battle of getting my Dad to do anything is putting the idea in his head first.
Mom was a master at this. She would mention something to Dad, and then when the time came to do it, she would tell him, "You've already said you would!"
"I did?"
"Yes, you did," was my Mom's final answer.
What was my Dad going to do? Call her a liar?
So my Dad would go along, because he was a man of his word. Even the ones that he never spoke. But back to our dinner...
"You ready to go, Dad?" I asked him, as everybody made their way into the den.
"Where are we going to eat?" he wanted to know.
"Cappeto's. That Italian restaurant you like."
"I'm not in the mood for Italian. It's too heavy."
"But everybody wants Cappeto's."
"I had a big breakfast," he told a starving room full of his children and grandchildren. "I'm not that hungry."
It didn't matter to him that the rest of us were practically passing out from hunger. He just didn't want Italian.
"Well, how about La Malinche? You like Mexican food."
"I told you, nothing too heavy. I'm still full from breakfast. You don't know how much your Mom feeds me. Sometimes I think she's trying to kill me, she feeds me so much."
I guess it never occurred or occurs to him when my Mom or my wife puts a feast in front of him that he doesn't have to eat everything, or that he can just ask for less.
"How about Chinese food? There's a good Chinese buffet by the Barnes & Noble."
"I don't like buffets."
"You don't?" That came as a surprise to all of us. Whenever he and our Mom went out to eat on their own, Dad always made his way to his favorite buffets. Hometown. Golden Corral. My wife's kitchen. "What do you mean, you don't?"
"I told you, I don't like buffets. I always eat too much."
"Well, how about just a regular Chinese restaurant."
"I don't like Chinese, either."
That was really limiting the places we could eat.
Burgers?
No.
Barbecue?
No.
Seafood?
No.
Moe's?
N... Moe's?
Apparently, we had hit on something.
"I like Moe's," Dad told us. Which was funny, because Moe's was a great barbecue place on the northeast side of town, and he had already said no to barbecue. It was owned and run by a husband and wife team out of Carolina. North Carolina? South? I forget, but it doesn't really matter, because their barbecue sauce is all you have to remember. It's delicious, and they just slather it on their ribs. That's what I like about Moe's. They're not stingy with the sauce.
"They have good sauce," my Dad added.
Everybody looked at everybody else, and it was decided.
Moe's, it was.
As we all started heading out the door, my Dad sat back down.
"Honey!" my wife called out to him. "What are you doing?"
My Dad turned the TV back on.
"Just bring me back some Moe's," he instructed.
Raising My Father
RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com
jimduchene.blogspot.com Fifty Shades of Funny
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