While we were waiting for the potatoes to boil for supper, I offered to run a 10-minute errand and return two videos for my sister.
“Will you pick up a gallon of milk?” she asked.
Before I could agree, my father said, “I’ll tag along and refill the gasoline can.”
“OK,” I said, as the errands multiplied. “But, I’ve got to dash home and get my purse.”
It was just a hundred-yard drive down the dirt road to my house, but Dad wouldn’t make the trip. Instead, he issued my travel orders: “You go home and get your purse. Come back, and honk your horn. I’ll come running. Don’t turn off the engine, and don’t worry. I won’t hold you up.”
I hurried, and even though I tried hard, I was not fast enough to catch my father in the position of holding me up. Dad jogged toward my car swinging his empty gas can, jumped in, and before I could pull out of the driveway, set the itinerary:
“Here’s what you need to do. Drop me at the gas station. While I’m filling my can, you take the movies back. Then, pick me up. If I have time, I’ll run inside the convenience store and buy the baby’s milk. But, if you get back first, park the car and you buy the milk. This way, I won’t be the one holding you up.”
I understand that telling me what to do is not the same thing as holding me up, but it produces a very similar result-irritation.
Growing peevish, I suggested, “Why don’t we both go to the video store and buy the milk and gas on the way home?”
He grumbled. “You must be afraid to go to the video store alone this time of night.”
He needed to believe that I was afraid to go alone, because if I weren’t, then I was suggesting that his plan was not as good as mine. I played the devil with him by contradicting him again.
“No. I am not afraid to go to the video store. I’m afraid to leave you alone at the gas station. What if someone knocked you on the head? You could be robbed. You could be killed.”
I parroted the litany of possible disasters that he had used to keep me obedient as a child. “It would be a full five minutes before I got back from the video store. You could be dead by then. I couldn’t live with myself if I knew I had stranded you in a dark parking lot this time of night.” (It was almost 6 p.m.)
Because I was driving, we followed my plan. We returned the videos and then went to the convenience store where the gas pump is. My father rode silently, staring intently out the window.
I didn’t want him to be mad. I was just on the verge of repenting of my rebellious ways when suddenly, before the car had come to a complete stop, my 66-year-old father threw a dollar bill at me, scrambled out of the car and called out my new instructions as he ran to the pump: “You go inside and buy the baby’s milk. Then, wait by the cash register to see if I go over a dollar on the pump. If I do, pay the difference, and I’ll reimburse you. Take your time. I’m completely at your disposal.”
The man was just too fast for me-too experienced at being in charge of creating the master plans to let a young (39-year-old) whippersnapper like me wrestle this authority away from him.
I did as I was told.
When I got back to the car, he was smiling. He announced smugly, “See, I’m right here. I’m not holding you up. I hate it when someone holds me up when I’m trying to run my errands.”
I hate that too, and I wanted to agree with my father-I really did-but some spirit of perversity just wouldn’t let me say the words.
