ahream

Okay, let’s just start off with the fact that he’s going to be fine. Fine, I tell you. Good as new. Yes, he’s very unwell right now. But we are going to fix it. AND HE IS GOING TO BE FINE.

My stepdad is sick. The kind of sick that involves procedures and specialists and long-term plans. (But did I mention he is going to absolutely, positively FINE? He will be. Just so we’re all clear on that.)

Stepdad is a weird word. I’m not sure what’s so “step” about him. It sounds like one step removed, and nothing could be further from our truth, which is why I suppose he’s always been called Dad Number 2….or sometimes Smokey the Bear. But that’s really a whole other story.

He’s the sort of Dad who goes to all your games wearing the school’s booster shirt and then video tapes the entire thing and saves them for that ever popular wedding montage movie. He shows up to pack your stuff and lift heavy furniture no matter how many times you move and will then get in the car with you without complaint and drive 2,000 miles to your new place – even if it means going through Colorado in the dead of winter with a four cylinder engine. And you know he checked the oil and the brakes and all the other fluid levels before you left without telling you because that’s the kind of thing he does.

When you think about it, stepdad is right down there with porta-potty-cleaner-outer on the list of jobs sane people volunteer for. Particularly when the prospective stepchild is a teenager, as I was. Normal, biological parents make detailed and well-reasoned plans for drowning their own children at 13. Really, it’s only the wiliness of the child and mandatory prison sentences keeping most of them alive. So who in their right mind would want to take on someone else’s parenting nightmare?

Dad Number 2.

Probably this is because he’s very big on organizing things. Every tool, every bolt, every issue of Field & Stream since 1982 has its place, which is good because he never throws anything away either. (Good for me too.) So when I came along in all of my sullen and obnoxious teenage glory, he just went, “Oh, wait. Teenagers go in this drawer.” And he picked me up and put me with his biological kids. Not in the special stepkid drawer, but in the big one with everybody else. (Probably organized according to height and marked with one of those old-fashioned label-making machines.) And that’s just the way it was right from the beginning. All of us in one big drawer.

So he’s going to be FINE. Because he has to be, and that’s just all there is to it.

ahream Dispatches from the City of Angels I'm a mystery writer living in and writing about Los Angeles. You can catch my short story, "Running Venice," in the new anthology LAndmarked for Murder. Look for it in bookstores and on Amazon.com now. In the meantime, feel free to poke around. Over at my website you can find even more blog entries than I could fit here, as well as a few other ramblings. Enjoy and come back often.
:: JOURNAL HOME :: SUBSCRIBE TO THIS JOURNAL :: WWW.AHREAM.COM :: FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER :: PHOTOS :: MYSPACE :: EMAIL ::
Previous Entry :: Next Entry Read/Post Comments (8) Most Recent Twitters: A 3-foot long alligator was found walking down the middle of the street in Venice Beach this morning. I love L.A. In case you were wondering, it is very difficult to get a hummingbird out of your house. They are irrational and prone to hysterics. L.A. Finds: The Nickel Diner on Main between 5th and 6th is a made-to-look-old, throwback of a place that melds into the old downtown and is, at the same time, part of the renaissance. They serve their burgers medium, their soda in bottles and offer all they can to locals in need. Flickr Updates: The second Thursday of every month is the Downtown Art Walk. The galleries stay open late, the restaurants are packed, bands perform on the streets. God, I love L.A. What I'm Reading: Attack of the Unsinkable Rubber Ducks by Christopher Brookmyre What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami Want E-Mail Updates? Click here, type your e-mail address into the first field (for public entries) and receive an e-mail note each time a new blog post goes up. (Photo updates, Twitters and "L.A. Finds" features not included. Those you have to swing by and check yourself.) Absolutely, positively no spam. Promise. Other author blogs: Sue Ann Jaffarian Eric Stone Christa Faust Lipstick Chronicles		2007-10-26 12:10 PM Dad II Okay, let’s just start off with the fact that he’s going to be fine. Fine, I tell you. Good as new. Yes, he’s very unwell right now. But we are going to fix it. AND HE IS GOING TO BE FINE. My stepdad is sick. The kind of sick that involves procedures and specialists and long-term plans. (But did I mention he is going to absolutely, positively FINE? He will be. Just so we’re all clear on that.) Stepdad is a weird word. I’m not sure what’s so “step” about him. It sounds like one step removed, and nothing could be further from our truth, which is why I suppose he’s always been called Dad Number 2….or sometimes Smokey the Bear. But that’s really a whole other story. He’s the sort of Dad who goes to all your games wearing the school’s booster shirt and then video tapes the entire thing and saves them for that ever popular wedding montage movie. He shows up to pack your stuff and lift heavy furniture no matter how many times you move and will then get in the car with you without complaint and drive 2,000 miles to your new place – even if it means going through Colorado in the dead of winter with a four cylinder engine. And you know he checked the oil and the brakes and all the other fluid levels before you left without telling you because that’s the kind of thing he does. When you think about it, stepdad is right down there with porta-potty-cleaner-outer on the list of jobs sane people volunteer for. Particularly when the prospective stepchild is a teenager, as I was. Normal, biological parents make detailed and well-reasoned plans for drowning their own children at 13. Really, it’s only the wiliness of the child and mandatory prison sentences keeping most of them alive. So who in their right mind would want to take on someone else’s parenting nightmare? Dad Number 2. Probably this is because he’s very big on organizing things. Every tool, every bolt, every issue of Field & Stream since 1982 has its place, which is good because he never throws anything away either. (Good for me too.) So when I came along in all of my sullen and obnoxious teenage glory, he just went, “Oh, wait. Teenagers go in this drawer.” And he picked me up and put me with his biological kids. Not in the special stepkid drawer, but in the big one with everybody else. (Probably organized according to height and marked with one of those old-fashioned label-making machines.) And that’s just the way it was right from the beginning. All of us in one big drawer. So he’s going to be FINE. Because he has to be, and that’s just all there is to it. Read/Post Comments (8) Previous Entry :: Next Entry Back to Top