My Father - Always Inappropriate

THE THING ABOUT SALADS.

    It was a rather warm summer day as my family and I headed down highway 7 on our way up for a good old fashion family week of fun at a rented cottage. A cottage we had rented for years prior and years to come.  The central part of Ontario is crawling with cottages stuffed with old furniture, other peoples bedding and a toilet that doesn’t or barely flushes. Cottages surrounded by trees, rocks and clean glorious lakes for swimming, fishing, and in my case catching frogs. This was one of those cottages. I was around the age of twelve and despite sitting next to my sister who is older by three years, I was peaceful and most likely dreaming of Jonathan Taylor Thomas. My father was driving, my mom next to him gazing out the open window which provided fields of cows and hay to look upon. There was not a sound inside the car, all was peaceful, all was great.

    In Canada, there is an ongoing joke that we have four seasons here; fall, winter, spring and construction. We had just escaped an hour or two of construction accompanied with hot air, my fathers verbal hot air and that annoying front and back dance you do from the motion of a car stopping and starting again. It never helped that my mother would and to this day does, grab the dash and sigh every time we are remotely close to another car on the highway. It felt like now, everyone was feeling the relief of being back in one forward uninterrupted direction, and all was well in the world.

    I love my father. I really love him, but sometimes, he's a dick.  I know, shitty to preface loving him to calling him a dick, especially when I am about to share a story that shows a slice of his personal life. Even shittier since my father is a very private man, who has already been embarrassed by me as the result of wild hair colour thought the years, a loud and opinionated personality, and a nose ring he still requests I remove. Again, my father is a good man, he has worked hard at everything he's received, worked for his family and loves us well, but sometimes, he really is a dick.

    Moving forward down the rural two lane highway, silence filled the car. I have always enjoy times of quiet, libraries still make me all warm and happy inside (that and the smell of old books and people crying in the self help isle....not that I haven't done that mind you.) At the start of my life I was a very shy quiet girl, but I have since found my voice (if you met my family and sat in on a dinner, you would see that I had no choice in the matter). I come from a family of talkers. Loud, opinionated talkers. So the silence truly was golden, until my dad stepped in with his amazingly inappropriate timing and delivery.

    In the glory of all this silence, my father turned to my mother and said a phrase I still drop to this day. After eighteen years of marriage, my father on this particular day, heading into a family vacation where it had started off so smoothly, decided to turn to my mother a drop a bomb. “You know Kim,” he said casually, “I've never really liked your salads.”

    Rewinding more here for a moment, my mom did essentially all the cooking in the family household. She cooked on a budget, fed the family well balanced meals, could take any leftovers reaming and create something new, all while providing meals that were delicious. In my adult life, I can now fully appreciate how difficult a task that is; and I can't imagine after all those years of work getting a fail on your side dish.

    The air fell almost even quieter for a moment, and my mom then turned her head to him and in a tone that was shrill and so very freaking angry said “What?!”

    I don't recall the details or particulars after this point, but I know the whistle had blown and the gloves were off. Comments starting firing abruptly inside the moving vehicle, coming predominantly from a red faced monster that had taken over the woman sitting in the passenger seat. I panicked, and wished I was nothing more than a stuffed Garfield happily stuck to the rear window, smiling at passengers in other cars. Instead of course, I found myself turning to my sister for solace.

    At this time in my life, entering teenage years, being a tween whose changing and ugly looking (I'm sorry but kids this age are just awkward looking – and you know I'm right), and having a teenage hormone raging sister meant we didn't always get along. We rarely got along in fact, outside of watching TV, family functions, and moments like the one that was unfolding.

    I turned and we made our usual “holy fucking shit” eye contact, and proceeded to sink into our seats as my father dealt with the wrath of saying, well, something really stupid. He explained in detail what it was he was lacking in his salad, which was other items to go with the iceberg lettuce, carrots and cucumbers. My mother rebutted with the threat that he can make his own meals when we get to the cottage, because it's never a vacation for her, she's always cooking. The dance between them lasted about a half hour, and somehow cooled off. The silence returned, the car continued forward, and it felt like all was well in the world.

    No one spoke for a brief time, and my mom seemed to have calmed down after exercising her vocal cords. I love my father, I really do, but sometimes, he doesn't think before he opens his mouth. And so, he turned to her once more and decided to bring a family friend into the mix. “You know who's salads I like,” as he spoke I tried to eject myself from the moving vehicle but the seatbealt kept locking with my frantic struggling, “Moe's salads” he paused. “She puts stuff in her salads.”

    I don't remember the specifics of the second round, but I know they had a rematch and no one won. I don't remember the rest of the car ride, pulling into the cottage, or which memories at the cottage accompany that particular car ride. I don't know if that was the summer I got covered in red ants, or the summer I flipped over the damn and lost my shoes, but I know that I will never forget the words of my father. Or the look on my mom's face when he said them.

    My father, has impeccable timing, horribly impeccable timing. But why not? It is so much fun the way he operates. I mean, my father never did really like her salads, so why dance around the subject by suggesting a new vegetable or making the salad himself when he can straight forward tell my mom that he doesn't like them. Furthermore, why tell her early in the game when he can wait for almost two decades to let her know. Adding lastly, why do this alone, when the whole family can be there to witness such an event.

    I know how my father works, I just don't full understand why. The end result of this glorious family moment however, is a line I can drop in the company of family and friends (who have heard this story at nausea) to create bursts of laughter. That, and my mothers salads now come fully stocked with leafy greens, and a whole lot of stuff.