Shrek’s dad

The current occupant of the extra room upstairs is the son of a couple who have determined that their life’s mission is to serve the needs of the people of Swaziland, where 50% of the population tests HIV positive. Shrek’s dad is an emergency care doctor who is well-qualified to minister to both their medical and their spiritual needs; his wife teaches the children English, helping them develop reading skills by studying from the book of Mark.

Dad has been back in Texas for several days now on something of a sabbatical and fund-raising mission. Since the home they built to their own specifications on a piece of land large enough to breed horses hasn’t sold in the months since they left for their new life in Swaziland, he moved back into it to camp out for the next several weeks and have a headquarters for his fund-raising opportunities.

Shrek and Number One Son have gone out to visit dad several times and to clean up the “guest house” on the property so Shrek can move into it; he'll be the local caretaker until the place sells. Sunday night dad invited us out for dinner there, ostensibly to thank NOS for his help and me for boarding Shrek for the past several weeks, but likely also to give dad some company; rolling around in that big, empty house for several days is probably plenty to make him lonely when he’s used to having a wife and busy life around.

Dad is 78 but in excellent health, and he was proud to show off his cooking skills on his classy convection stovetop, quickly sautéing a salmon steak and a potful of mixed greens. The guys disappeared for most of the time he was cooking (I suspect pursuing their connections with coffin nails), so I asked dad about his story. I found out about three older half-brothers I hadn’t known Shrek had, along with several amusing stories about how dad and his wife had wound up together (although surprisingly I didn’t find out much about Swaziland).

The boys drifted back in time to eat but disappeared before time to clean up. Dad continued his story until about the time I was ready to call a halt to it, which was also about the time the boys showed back up to “rescue me” from dad’s long-winded tale. I played along and was happy to get home, whether I had been “rescued” or not.

Yesterday was my long day at the office—my class meets at 5 and lets our around 6:30—so I was expecting NOS to take care of supper for me. He called to let me know dad had invited Shrek and him back out to eat and assured me that he’d bring home a corner of his steak if I didn’t get home in time to go with them. As it turned out, I had several items to handle before I could leave the office, so I pulled into the driveway just as they were coming out the door. They piled into my car and off we went.

This time I knew about dad and the long-winded stories, and I was already tired from the day at the office, so I was all set to watch for opportunities to extricate myself shortly after we ate. I even had a good excuse: it was late, I was tired, and I needed to get my rest!

True to form, as soon as dinner was over, the boys lit out to light up, so I was left visiting with dad. This time the conversation turned to writing poetry and some poems he was proud of that his wife had written. Obviously, I really needed to see her work, so when the guys came back in, dad got Shrek to help him hook up his printer so he could print them out for me.

While they solved the computer problems, NOS went quietly about cleaning up the kitchen. He couldn’t locate dish soap, but he figured a good rinse with hot water would be at least a head start, so he happily worked on scrubbing out the stuck-on residue from the cooking pans. He also splashed out the dishes we had used for dinner, and I had dad plenty wound down to let us go.

In one of his rare shows of energy, Shrek decided he could help dad out by rinsing out the remaining dishes littered about the kitchen, so he piled up a stack of gently-used Styrofoam plates and some plastic glasses and started rinsing and wiping them. Since I was eager to go, I felt as if he took interminably long times to rinse each plate, but then he started the cups.

Keeping in mind that he hadn’t located soap, about the best he could hope for was a thorough rinsing, which by my definition entails splashing a bit of water into the bottom of the cup, swishing the cup a bit, wiping the lip, and flashing back under the water. If I have more than one or two to wash at my house, I fill a sink with  enough water to swish them out, and I often drain and refill it to rinse.

Not Shrek. He set the faucet to spray and patiently waited as it slowly filled each glass. He wiped blindly around the rim, emptied the water, then filled the cup again to rinse it. Each cup took forever, and he “washed” a dozen or more that way. (I was leaning on the counter next to a bottle of dishwasher soap. I handwash dishes at home because NOS and I usually accumulate a couple of plates and glasses and a pot that can’t go in the dishwasher; for this pile of stuff, I would definitely have cranked up the machine.)

Dad had plenty of time to print not only the poem that I just had to read but to locate, print, and tell me the story behind at least two more. He admitted he was prejudiced about their quality because they were written by the wife that he adores; I thought they were okay but certainly not remarkable. Of course, I was tired and I wanted to go home, so I might have been biased, too.

When Shrek finally had "washed" all the dishes he saw, we started making our way to the door—now already after 10 o’clock. As soon as we got out of earshot of the house, the boys started apologizing again for dad’s long-windedness.

“Dad?” I asked. “You’re blaming dad for this? Baloney!”

Huh? Dad was the one telling the story, wasn’t he?

“Yeah, but last time I was finding out interesting stuff, and I could have left whenever I wanted to. Tonight, I didn’t want to make dad feel like some woman was coming into his home and cleaning up after him, so I stayed out of your way.

“The problem is not that dad was telling too many stories. You guys don’t know how to wash dishes!”