Song Lyric of the Day:
When I look in my father’s eyes. / My father’s eyes. / Then the light begins to shine /And I hear those ancient lullabies.
Eric Clapton / “My Father’s Eyes”
9:15PM.
Happy Father’s Day!
After being in Virginia the last five years, I finally got to spend Father’s Day with my dad again. And it was wonderful.
Rich and I invited our parents over for dinner to celebrate. When they first arrived, both dads glued themselves to the couch in front of our spectacular new baby, our 56-inch Samsung HDTV DLP rear projection TV, to watch the end of a golf game. After a tour around the house showing off all the home improvement projects we have in progress, we sat down for dinner.
Rich prepared two different stir fry vegetarian dishes, a spiced vegetables with coconut stir fry and a bean curd stir fry that was devoured quite quickly. As I have not joined Rich in vegetarianism, I marinated and grilled New York strip steaks and chicken. I also made garlic ranch roasted red potatoes. For dessert we had ice cream, a marble pistachio cake I made, and pie Doug and Carol brought over. Dinner was a smashing success, with our parents admitting they could get used to us cooking for them now that we are close by again. After finishing dinner and dessert, we presented our dads with their gifts. My dad got a gift card to Best Buy, while Rich’s dad got a gift card to Lowe’s; Rich and I decided to play to their respective interests.
What can I say? I am very lucky to have the dad I have. He has always encouraged me in everything I’ve done and been proud of me. He taught me to always be proud of who I am, and of my Puerto Rican heritage. He has also shown me what true strength is by quitting drinking cold turkey almost 15 years ago, for which I am proud of him. I feel like once he stopped drinking, that is when I truly got to start to know my dad. And I really love the person he has turned out to be. I feel like we have been able to grow together, not only strengthening our father-daughter bond, but becoming friends as well. It doesn’t hurt that occasionally he has been pretty cool (as has Mom). Let me reiterate that–occasionally cool. 🙂 He is still a parent, after all.
Papa Doug, Rich’s dad, has also been a great father to me since Rich and I first got together. Like Mama Carol, he welcomed me into the family with open arms. I admire the father he has been to Rich, because he helped shape the man I fell in love with and married.
I look forward to spending many more Father’s Days and Mother’s Days with all my parents.
We have great memories of that evening. It wasn’t too difficult to sit there and be waited on by your children. Lupe and I caught on to that very quickly. All the food was wonderful! It was a very special time. love you, momma carol
….and those were such nice gifts you gave the fathers! momma carol