Hippy Hippy Shake
"Mnhnhm, zo?" said my father into the phone, from three thousand miles away. That's code for, "Hello, this is your father calling."
It's funny; Kay does that, too, when she calls me. I'll pick up the phone and say, "Hello?" and she'll go, "Mmnhmn." She's been doing it since we were ten, and now that she lives in Bermuda, we almost never talk on the phone, but when we do, that's how she greets me. And it's OK, because she's my BFF.
It's OK with my Daddy, too.
So it wasn't his manner of greeting that alarmed me, but the fact that he called me at all. My father is one of those people for whom the phone is the vehicle for delivering only very bad, or very good, news. Your cousin in Germany had a baby would, in my father's priorities, warrant a mention next time he saw me, but would not warrant a phone call.
I tried to sound non-chalant. "How's my car?" I asked.
"Oh, vell, it's running good. I drove it the other day."
"Ah ha. That's good. So you're not calling to tell me anything happened to it, then?"
"No, no. I'm going into the hospital tomorrow morning at 7:00, for a hip replacement surgery."
I've been told more than once in my life, by people who know me well and some who know me hardly at all, that I'm not very good at small talk.
I come by it honestly.
Labels: family
5 Comments:
Heheheheh, brilliant. My mother at least gave me a week's notice of hers :-)
Haha. My dad's the same way, and I also inherited it. My mom did all the talking for him (us).
My mother-in-law does that, but its because she wants pity and wants it NOW.
I hope his surgery goes well.
Does that mean he can lay bricks again ?
I was reading your blog this morning and thought I would drop a line about hips and fathers. I am of an age now where some friends have gone the hip replacement route. Its pretty invasive surgery, but also very "routine". My friend Dave, who was only 55 when he had one hip replaced, was out of the hospital and moving around in a few days. His mobility before the surgery was limited enough that he was having trouble getting in and out of his car. Within a couple of days, no problem (except he wasn't allowed to drive because it was a manual transmission and they didn't want him using the new hip joint to press the clutch.)
Now I'm rambling. My point is, it's not a big deal now - and worth the pain of the surgery.
As to the communication method - my father did the same thing - I didn't find out he had a pacemaker put in until about a week after the surgery. I think its endemic with that generation (the ones affected by the 2nd World War).
Sorry I missed meeting you when you where home in the winter. Perhaps another time.
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