When I was 11 or 12 years old, I remember having a conversation with my dad, Bob J., about something that had happened recently on our farm. I don’t remember exactly what it was–it wasn’t anything of real consequence–but I remember being slightly surprised that this was the first I was hearing of this event. This wasn’t unusual though: since I only lived with him in Kansas during summer and Christmas breaks, a lot would happen when I was away.
However, since he had used the wonderfully ambiguous phrase, “just the other day…” to describe when it had happened, it was still unclear to me when said event went down. I had heard him use that phrase on a frequent enough basis, that I decided it was high time I got a better feel for what it meant to him.
With an air of curiosity, I asked him, “Oh, yeah. Cool. When exactly did this happen?”
Nonchalantly, he replied “A few weeks ago, I reckon…”
Okay, good enough. Not the most precise answer, but it would suffice for our farm-centric conversations.
Not too long after that, I found myself in a conversation with him about someone we knew that had passed away–you guessed it–“the other day.”
Again I found myself surprised but not too surprised upon hearing this news. But at least this time, I had an idea of when this had happened.
I decided to confirm just to be sure, though. After all, there was still a chance that we were in the window of opportunity to make it to the funeral.
“Oh, so ‘the other day’? So two or three weeks ago then, yeah?”
“Huh? What? Lord, no. He died 4 years ago.”
I subsequently responded the only way one could in that situation: I threw up my hands and walked away in exasperation.
So…the lesson I learned, much to my frustration, was that “just the other day” was meant literally. In other words, “something happened, but it didn’t happen today.”
Complete. ----- Waste. Of [Father-Son Communication and] Breath, Dad.
Sarcastically: “I’m glad we had this talk.”
This was one of several “Bob J. idiosyncrasies” that drove me mad throughout my childhood and young adult life, so much so that it made it into the cannon of Things I’ve Told My Wife Multiple Times Each Time Acting As Though It Was New Information To Her.
Not to brag, but our 2-year-old daughter, referred to as The Younger in these parts, is somewhat, er, verbose for her age. Anyone who has been around a chatty toddler will indubitably tell you what a delight it is to get a peak inside their developing minds.
Just the other night I was laying down with her trying to get her to go the ----- to sleep. She kept trying to hide her head underneath the covers, and I had to keep telling her that it wasn’t safe, but she would not heed my fatherly wisdom. The result was that I had to tussle with her for 10-15 minutes, repeatedly extracting her from under the covers after each time she had burrowed deep into them.
Okay, so that detail wasn’t quite relevant, other than I was pretty sure I had her tuckered out.
She finally settled down, and after laying next to her in silence in the dark for about 15 minutes, I was pretty sure I was in the clear to sneak out of her room and enjoy my evening like any grown-ass man should be able to do.
A mere seconds before I was to make a break for it, out of the darkness came a disembodied voice: “Last year, I saw a big fire.”
Shit. She was awake.
But what in the hell was she talking about? She’s not even 2 1/2 years old–what the heck would she know about “last year”?
So, I decided to ask a few probing questions.
“Oh yeah, when was this again?
“When we was is camping.”1She make speak eloquently 95% of the time, but she still manages to butcher the syntax of the English language on occasion.
Hmmm…interesting. She’s never been camping in her short life.
“Oh yeah, who all was there?”
“Mommy, and Grandma, and Sissy, and Daddy. And me.”
Hmmph. That narrowed it down to either a vacation or a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday when my mom takes care of our little rascals.
“Umm, and where was this?”
“In our back yard.”
Ah, she meant the campfire the Elder and I had made when we “practiced camping” in our backyard…a few weeks into the COVID-19 quarantine. So…barely a month ago?
“Last year,” my ass.
And then just the other day–yesterday, to be exact–she injured one of her fingers when it got smushed by a closing door.
This morning she held up her injured finger and declared to the Boss Lady:
I pinched my pinky in the door last year!
A toddler struggling with the concept of the passage of time
Trying to stifle our laughter, the Boss Lady and I exchanged knowing looks.
Seeing an opportunity to share a pointless story from life, I attempted to dive right into the most relevant narrative that came to mind.
“That reminds me of Dad and–“
Rolling her eyes, the Boss Lady interrupted me, “Yes, yes, I know–she must have inherited it from ‘Just-The-Other-Day-Bob-J.’ You must be so proud of your strong seed.”
“Oh. *long pause* So I already told you, huh?”
The point of the story is…
Well, how do we really know that we’re not like the robot hosts from HBO’s hit T.V. series WestWorld? You gotta admit the evidence is rather compelling: apparently we’re never really sure of the answer to the question “when am I?” And at least one of us is stuck in my own time-loops, telling the same ----- stories over and over again.
Well, how do we really know that we’re not like the robot hosts from HBO’s hit T.V. series WestWorld? You gotta admit the evidence is rather compelling: apparently we’re never really sure of the answer to the question “when am I?” And at least one of us is stuck in their own time-loops, telling the same ----- stories over and over again.
Well, how do we really know that we’re not like the robot hosts from HBO’s hit T.V. series WestWorld? You gotta admit the evidence is rather compelling: apparently you’re never really sure of the answer to the question “when am I?” And at least one of us is stuck in your own time-loops, telling the same ----- stories over and over again…
Go ahead. You know you want to squash that pesky fly on your neck…2For those of you who haven’t seen WestWorld and don’t plan to, this is a reference to the pivotal scene in the 1st season in which a main character, Delores–an android programmed to hurt no living thing–miraculously kills the fly on her neck, a portent omen of some really bad shit to come.
Content created on: 30 April/1 May 2020 (Thurs/Fri).
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