2000-05-26
I had an usually long conversation with my father the other night. What motivated me to call him was my brother's informing me that my father and his paramour of three-plus years had split. My brother had no real dirt, and I wanted the full story. I didn't get it, exactly, but I confirmed my suspicion that my father was none too broken up about the breakup. He's too classy to speak ill of her, I guess, but he did intimate that "Things had been building for some time."
He then said something about one chapter closing, another beginning, and I said his friends were probably lining up the fix-ups already. Yes, he confirmed, at a bat mitzvah he'll be attending soon there will be a very charming widow eager to meet him. I told him I'd keep him in mind if I met any interesting older women, which prompted him to ask whether I'd heard Ted Turner is dating a someone in her twenties (I hadn't).
Earlier in the conversation he'd uncharacteristically expressed admiration for a decision I made when I was 12 (*), so I took the opportunity to tell him I thought it was cool that he dated women his own age. He said the younger ones just don't interest him. I have a friend in her mid-fifties who's met my father a number of times and made it clear she'd be happy to go out with him; now I know for certain she's out of luck.
Another noteworthy part of our conversation. In a particular context, I muttered the truism "Nothing's perfect."
His response: "Well, almost nothing's perfect. One thing is."
"And what's that?" I asked.
"The egg," he said. "How could you improve on that?"
How indeed.
*
Early tomorrow morning I get on a plane for Chicago. My best friend, who lives there, will meet me and then we'll get on another plane together. We're going to the town where we went to college back in the early 1980s. It's our 15-year reunion, and never having been to any reunion ever, I haven't a clue as to what to expect. She and I will be together, though; anything beyond that is gravy.
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* The decision: After scoring high on a standardized test, I was invited into an accelerated math program. It required going to a different school a certain number of afternoons per week from four to six, not participating in the regular math program at my school. I went for the first two or three sessions, but soon decided I just didn't care enough about math to continue. Last night he said he thought that showed courage. I suppose, but in part, I just wanted to fit in with my new junior high peers.
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