the fives

The assignment was to list five first and then five lasts, then to write 500 words on it...

 5 significant firsts:

1) drove a car

2) got drunk

3) preached in church

4) gave birth

5) got a job on my own

5 significant lasts:

1) saw my father alive

2) my ankle didn’t hurt

3) preached at MPUMC

4) graduated

5) fasted from facebook

Lasts are easier to remember, I guess. But I like them less. They tend to be about endings; thus, the “last” part. Sometimes those endings are good things, though. For instance, the last time I saw my father was one of his last days and they called me a couple of days later to see if I wanted them to pull the plug on him. What a horrible thing to ask someone. I guess if he wanted the child with whom he had that great relationship with to make this decision he should have let someone know before he slipped into a coma. And yet, his death was the ending of his addiction and not just his life. At the same time, it was the ending of my dream of having a healthy and happy relationship with my father. In many ways, his death was good.

I don’t want to talk about that, though. I used to have to spend the summers with my father in Minnesota. My parents divorced when I was seven and I was required by my mother to spend my summers and Christmas vacation up there until I was 13. So, I was still contractually obligated to visit the summer I was 12. That summer my dad decided that it was time for my stepsister to learn to drive to drive—she was almost 15. Lori, as it turns out, was not a naturally gifted driver. However, she was significantly better than her sister who was so bad that we would fight over which one of us got to wear the crash helmet if we had to ride with her.

During this summer, we went to Montevideo--think Little House on the Prairie-- to see my stepmother’s parents. It was the country and so he thought that it was safe for her drive, so he asked her if she wanted to go for a drive. My dad was the not the nicest person in the world. Besides being a drunk—not something that we had realized the implications for at this point in our lives—he had a quick, mean tongue. Knowing him, Lori was hesitant to say yes, but the lure of driving was too great for her and so she caved. On the way out, he asked me if I wanted to go along with them. I was bored-- had already stared at the corn and the dog for a couple of hours—so, I said yes. About 2 miles into the drive, my dad had had enough of Lori’s weaving and wavering, hemming and hawing and yelled at her to pull over. He couldn’t dare to see her ruin his transmission or worse yet crash his most beloved thing in the world (the thing that he talked about as long as I can remember with more fondness than anything else)—his red Dodge Ram truck.  His greatest loves in life: my mom, that Dodge truck and his dog Shelly.

After yelling at Lori to pull over, he instructed me to get behind the wheel. I drove his truck with ease. He told me I was a great driver. This is one of the view memories I have of him saying nice things to me about me.