The Boys Watch The Game

I’m just back from dinner with my father, Carol, Lea, and Phil. One of those dinners where we started out big, ordering as many appetizers as we could see. And when one of us was on the fence about a certain item, another of us would chime in, "Yeah, go ahead. We want that, too." We ended with many spoons and fewer dessert plates, a single decaf, and a childhood lunchtime game involving pushing a single quarter across a table, hoping that in three tries, we could land it on the edge of the table. At one point we all put our hands in the air, as if we were watching the World Cup. And I realized as people turned that we were that table. The loud people. Not too loud, just loud enough to remind me of how wonderful it is to be around family.

Upon returning home, we all settled into the living room, deciding what we’d do. Who would turn in, who’d stay up for a full movie, who wanted a score. And in that pause, I just wanted to find the perfect something that would keep us all together. I wanted to click to a movie no one could turn away from, something 20 minutes in, so no one could say, "Oh, no, I can’t sit through a whole movie." I wanted so much to keep us all there, and hoping for that reminded me so much of what it was like to be a child. To want to please your parents, to keep them delighted enough to stay. For them to love the moment so much that they’ll ignore the phone, or the potroast, and order-in instead. I want so much to preserve all our moments, to make these visits last longer than they ever do. They’re always too short. I wish we could all live in the living room all the time. Just seperate bathrooms.

A YEAR AGO: Brunch & My Thighs: The New White Meat
2 YEARS AGO: Splendors in the Grass
3 YEARS AGO: Summer Rolls
4 YEARS AGO: Everything Living Runs From the Rain, Pad Locks
5 YEARS AGO: Follow Through