Continuing decades of absolutely terrible communication skills, my dad calls to tell me he's picking up his mother.

Me: "Oh, she's going to live with you now?"

Dad: "Nah. I'm picking her up from the morgue."

Me: "Oh."

Me: "What happened?"

Dad: "She died."

Me: "How?" She was 95, so probably not skydiving or in a bank heist.

Dad: "I don't know. No one will tell me. But the cops just showed up to let me know she's dead. None of her caretakers are answering their phones. So I'm going to Connecticut tomorrow. I have no idea what I need to do. I guess I'll call you when I get there."

Me: "Ok. Let me know if there is anything I can do."

Dad: "Talk to you later."

​2019 can suck a bag of porcupines.

My Dad: "I see you brought chicken broth. How much did you pay for it?"

Me: "I don't know."

My Dad: "Tomorrow is Black Friday. You could have gotten two boxes for $4."

Me: "Then I wouldn't have had it to make dinner with today."

My Dad: "We should pick some up tomorrow so you'll have them for next year."

​Me: "I'll pass."

Me: Did you ship something to the store this week?

My Dad: Yea.

Me: I thought so. You addressed it to yourself and you didn't put the store name on it, so nobody was sure who it was for.

My Dad: Yea, I wrote my name with your address on one label, and your name with my address on the other. I figured the address was the important part.

Me: Ok. What's in it?

My Dad: Oh, I got you a pair of jeans, a windbreaker, and a leather jacket.

Me: For my birthday?

My Dad: Oh no. It was your birthday?

Me: Yea. Tuesday.

My Dad: I didn't even get you a card.

Me: But you got me jeans and two jackets*. I can wear those. I can't wear a card.

This man has bought me clothes exactly once since I was in high school. A few years ago, he sent me four xxxl t-shirts and a pair of jeans I could have used as a hammock.

My Dad: I think I got you the right size this time. If not, you can return them.

Me: Ok. Where did you get them?

My Dad: From a catalog.

Me: Ok. What catalog?

My Dad: I forget the name of it but I put the catalog and a bunch of coupons in with the clothes, in case you wanted to order more.

Me: Ok. I'll let you know if everything fits.

My Dad: Sounds good. I'll work on getting you a birthday present sometime soon. What did your mom get you?

Me: A card.

​My Dad: You can't wear a card. Does this mean I win?

My Dad: There's cream cheese in the fridge in the garage.

Me: When did you buy it?

My Dad: It's still good.

​Me: Dad, this cream cheese is older than my cats.

My Dad: "Ok. Mr. Boston, time to watch Cheers."

Me: "Mr. Boston? I live in Cambridge."

My Dad: "But you go to that Cheers bar."

Me: "No I don't."

My Dad: "You've never been there?"

Me: "I don't think so. Maybe? Once?"

My Dad: "People from Boston don't go to The Cheers all the time?"

Me: "Are you going senile, dad? Do you go to The Jaws Beach all the time?"

My Dad: "So that's a no?"

Me: "No."

But now we're watching Cheers.You know, like people from Boston do.

My father likes to impress me by his ability to predict what is going to happen in a TV show that came out fifty years ago, that he has probably seen three or four times a year for the last decade. In this way, he is like his mother who tries to impress me with her predictions about Law & Order reruns.

The only difference is that my grandmother is always wrong and my dad is right about 60% of the time.

"You know how all of those people are getting on that giant, fancy boat? I bet it's going to sink."

"But, dad, The Titanic is unsinkable!"

The following is a series of Facebook Statuses made from a bus, and then a boat, as I made my way from my current home of Cambridge to the place of my ancestral homeland, Martha's Vineyard.

---------------------------------------------

I apologize to the people whose seat is so far back I can taste their shoulderblades because the entire bus must unite to battle the insane woman tunelessly mumbling the lyrics to Christmas Carols loud enough that I can hear her through my headphones.

---------------------------------------------

Oh no, insane mumbling woman and person tunelessly relaying Christmas lyrics are two different people AND THEY ARE BECOMING LOUD FRIENDS.

---------------------------------------------

"ARE YOU IN A BAND?"

"NO, I CAN"T FIND ANYONE AS COMMITTED AS I AM."

"I HATE IT WHEN PEOPLE DON'T COMMIT TO THINGS. DO YOU LIKE NEW YORK?"

"I HAVE NEVER BEEN TO NEW YORK."

"YOU SHOULD GO. THAT'S WHERE ALL THE PEOPLE WITH MUSIC GO."

"REALLY?"

"YEA. OH MY GOD. YOU'RE SO YOUNG. YOU'RE SO BEAUTIFUL. YOU HAVE SUCH A GREAT VOICE."

I wish my seat back went back about three rows.

-------------------------------------------------------

The loud peoples' names are Karen and Tray, in case you were wondering. And I know you were.

-------------------------------------------------------

"AM I BEING TOO LOUD?"

"YOU SHOULDA TOLD ME."

"I DON'T CARE. ASSHOLE. SORRY. AM I BEING TOO LOUD? WATCH OUT WILD DRIVER. HAHA. SORRY, AM I BEING TOO LOUD? I'M SORRY. YOU DIDN'T DESERVE THAT. I'M SORRY. SORRY. I DON'T MEAN TO BE SO LOUD. AM I BEING LOUD?"

--------------------------------------------------------

Tray, the Christmas Carol warbler has grown completely silent, realizing he has lost the title of Craziest Person On The Bus.

--------------------------------------------------------

Tray gets off the bus in Bourne. Karen starts to follow him off before realizing that she has no idea where she is.

"HOW LONG UNTIL WE GET TO BOSTON?"

I stare blankly at her.

"HOW. LONG. UNTIL. BOSTON?"

I feign concern. "Pardon?"

"BOSTON? CHRIST. WHEN DO WE GET TO BOSTON."

We, of course, departed from Boston about an hour previous. "Je suis desole. Je ne parle pas Anglais."

"KEY-RIST. WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH YOU? WHEN BOSTON?"

"I sorry. I no speak good English." I shrug.

"WHEN THE--"

Mr. Seatback says, "He doesn't speak English. We're not going to Boston. We're coming FROM Boston. We're going to Woods Hole."

"OH RIGHT. I MUST HAVE FALLEN ASLEEP AND THE BUS IS GOING THE OTHER WAY NOW." Karen says. She is wrong. She got on just after me at South Station.

Mrs. Seatback asks "Could you lower your voice, please? We're in an enclosed space. There is no need to shout."

"SORRY. I MUST HAVE FALLEN ASLEEP. WHEN DO WE GET TO BOSTON?"

Mr. Seatback sighs. "In an hour. Go back to sleep."

"FUCK YOU, ASSHOLE. SORRY, SORRY. YOU DIDN'T DESERVE THAT."

Then Karen goes and sits back down, occasionally muttering to herself for the duration of the trip.

In Woods Hole, I make sure to put at least two people between me and Karen, so that when she inevitably stumbles into someone, "I'M SORRY. YOU DIDN'T DESERVE THAT. THE BUS SWERVED. IT SWERVED." It's parked. "I'M SORRY." I'm not the one she's stumbling into.

I move fast enough that there's no line to get my tickets to the ferry. Mr. and Mrs. Seatback walk to the also lineless window next to mine.

I ask, "Could I have a round trip to The Vineyard please?"

Mrs. Seatback's eyes balloon.

"Sure thing. That'll be sixteen dollars." The guy behind the window says.

"Thank you so much. Have a Happy Holiday." I say.

"I think you mean A MERRY CHRISTMAS." Mr. Seatback says.

"I don't think I do." I say. "But then again, my English isn't very good."

----------------------------------------------------------------------

For those concerned that I am mocking Karen for being mentally deficient, I should point out that she didn't appear to be mentally disabled, but you could smell the gin on her breath from the Mars Rover.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Karen just ran a full loop around the ferry following some poor steamship authority employee. I'm not quite motivated enough to find out what's going on in this part of her Soap Opera.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

She's back!

"IS THE BOAT GOING THAT WAY?" She points to the front of the boat.

"Sorry. No English."

She sits down a few rows away.

"WHERE ARE WE GOING NOW?"

----------------------------------------------------------------------

She also just tried to buy a drink from the very friendly guy behind the counter.

She was not served.

"WHY CAN'T I HAVE ANOTHER BEER." She, of course, has not had a beer since at least getting on the bus nearly three hours ago.

"We're not serving anymore." The guy says. "But I AM about to play a very naughty Christmas Carol."

"WHY AREN'T YOU SERVING ANYMORE? I'M SORRY. I DON'T MEAN TO BE NOSEY BUT FUCK I WANT A BEER."

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Mr. Seatback, who I had not seen since getting on the boat just kept her from walking out to the open deck, probably saving her drunk life.

I guess he's not all bad.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

"IT IS SO WINDY IN HERE!" Karen says, though we are in an enclosed part of the ferry. 

I mean, Mr. Seatback has been sighing a lot but I don't think it's enough to be called "windy".

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

I got caught breaking character on my way off the boat. She was standing between me and the exit and she said "JUST GO AROUND. GO AROUND ME."

And I said. "Thank you."

And she looked bewildered but didn't say anything.

Also, if you had two and a half minutes in the "How long before Adam's dad says something racist about Ferguson" then congratulations you win the deep foreboding sense of decay in American society.

My inability to hold boring small talk with strangers is proof of nature over nurture. Friday night, my father, my stepmother, Ben and I managed to have a ten minute discussion on how cold it was. It was really fucken cold. That could have summed the whole discussion up. 

To rectify the coldness, my father and his wife are headed to Cancun. My mother is in Florida. I have been walking around the streets of Boston with Ben at two o'fucken clock in the morning to get milkshakes, because really, what warms a frigid body more than cold milk blended with ice cream? 

"You should use some of the family's timeshare in Florida." My father says. "It only costs about $400, and you could take like eight people down there with you. That's fifty bucks a piece." My father, the human abacus. 

Maybe I should. I haven't taken a vacation since...I don't know. I went on tour with Steggy in 2003, I moved to Arifuckenzona a few months later. Since then, the furthest I've ventured is to my grandparents in Connecticut. 

"My mother's pissed at me." My father says. "You've seen that commercial with the old guy who shuffles, and can't remember things? Your grandfather has that, and I'm trying to tell Ma she should tell the doctor to have him checked for it but" and small talk and small talk and small talk. 

I should go to Florida. Or California. Or go to Vegas with Ben. 

My father says, "Last time I went to Vegas, I learned to only take $200 with me. That way I won't spend more than I can afford. And if I make money, great. I've been doing really well at the dog track lately." and small talk and small talk and small talk about medium money. 

"Your parents are remarkable." Ben says, on our way back to his house. "I've never seen someone be so interestingly boring. And they're so...nice. What happened to you?" 

Nature over nurture. "I don't know." But I remember my father's temper when he was still with my mother. The way she taught me to work him into a rage. He was never the violent asshole father depicted in movies of the week or cop shows, but he had his moments of my body slammed to the wall head first into wheelbarrow the coffee table splintered my grandmother standing between us. But he didn't mellow with age. He didn't have a revelation or therapy or karma. He just got away from us. A small island with a woman who loved him more than power, kids who would offer him grandchildren. 

"She's so smart." My father says of my stepniece. "She's fifteen months old and when her parents watch television too long, she climbs on to the table in front of them and dances. And sometimes" small talk small talk small talk "and we gave her one of your old Raggedy Andy dolls?" 

"One of?" Ben asks. 

"Yea, I had a big one from my grandparents, and a small one that we got from this place on the Cape, years before we moved there. It's weird, Jennifer had one too, and she got it around the same time. It's possible that we actually met when we were―" 

"Wait." Ben says. "You had two Raggedy Andys but no Raggedy Ann?" 

I know where this is going. "Yea." 

"Well that explains a lot." 

"It was because of my red hair that people got them for me." 

"Oh, I'm not judging you. I just think it's funny. When I was a little kid I had My Little Ponys because my best friends were girls and they had them. I just didn't know any better." He laughs. And under his breath I hear "Two raggedy Andys. Homo." 

I'd kick him under the table, but it's a small table and the angles are all wrong. 

"Sorry about the gay jokes." Ben says on the T ride home. "But, really, two Raggedy Andys but no Ann? Gaaaaaay," 

Before Ben, the only gay person my father met through me was Elvis. It was after things had started to go horribly horribly wrong, so Elvis wasn't terribly talky, just terrible. He mostly moped that he was on an expensive resort island and no one was buying him anything. He had a bus ticket home in his not so distant future. My father, like my mother and all my friends, hated him. But unlike my mother and all my friends, he didn't say a word about it. To this day, he's never asked how Elvis was doing or what happened to him. Elvis was there, then he was gone. He probably doesn't even remember the false name Elvis gave him (because if he'd given his real name, who could forget it?). 

My dad likes Ben. I know because he called me from Cancun (and my dad NEVER calls me) to small talk and mention that "that Ben kid seemed really nice. Anytime you want to come down to the island together, let me know." 

"It's tough to get him out of Boston." Ben says. "But I'll try." 

So there is balance to the universe. Ben's dad likes me. My dad likes Ben. 

"How come I didn't get to meet him when I came to visit?" My mother asks. 

"He was in New York, remember? I had you drop me off at his house so I could feed his cat." 

"Well, next week I want you to come down and get all the stuff you want out of the old house so we can put it on the market. You should bring him with you." 

Um. Um. Um. Um.

Pilgrim's Academy was my chance to start over. None of the kids in my new school knew that I had been third-grade famous for my Woody Woodpecker impersonation, or that Queen Popular Sarah The First had caught me picking my nose in fifth grade science class. Nobody had heard about the time Kevin Harris pushed me off my porch and broke my arm. Nobody even knew who Kevin Harris was. I was safe.

I've never asked my parents precisely why they decided I should go away to a private middle school. I think they believed that I was too smart for the public school system, and that's why my grades had been dropping. It couldn't have been because I was bored with the facts the teachers mumbled, and terrified of the small humans who were supposed to be my peers.

Whatever the reason, I'm mostly grateful. I've heard stories about what happened during my two year absence from the public education system: group showers, rat tails, stabbings, a pregnant girl, marijuana. The most exciting thing I can remember from my two years at Pilgrim's was when the Latin teacher had a nervous breakdown between third and fourth periods, and stormed out of her classroom yelling that my friend Scott and I were "trying to destroy" her and her "teaching curricula". That night, she called our parents, and the parents of a few of our classmates, and told them how "ill-behaved" and "dangerous" we were. After a brief investigation into our third and fourth period activities (the highlight of third period being that my teacher failed to collect the homework I didn't do, and the highlight of fourth period being that nobody blamed me for the fart someone dropped in the darkroom), the Headmaster issued a written and verbal apology to all the children and parents involved, and the Latin teacher was demoted to assistant librarian.

It was during the Pilgrim's years that I fell in love with the idea of Jennifer. Long brown hair, green eyes, nose that wrinkled pleasantly when she laughed at my stupid, stupid jokes. After voluntarily going to a couple of her cello recitals, and convincing her tutor me in Science, I finally got the courage to ask her out, and was stunned when she said "Yes." I was less stunned when she dumped me four days later, confessing that she'd only really gone out with me because she wanted to make out with my supposed best friend, Scott. And he hadn't noticed her at all, until she started tongue kissing me during lunch.

I'd like to say I spent the rest of the year shunning both my treacherous friend, and that filthy hobag, Jennifer. But I didn't. I continued to worship my ex-best friend's new girlfriend. And pretended to not hate Scott for his betrayal. After all, they were my best friends.

Unlike public school friendships, private school friendships are hindered by distance. No one in my school lived in the same neighborhood that I did. Only two of them lived in the same town, and neither of them were my friends. So, during most school vacations, I stayed home alone and began my affair with computers. Typing elaborate fantasy stories, and some of the worst rhyming couplets recorded by twentieth century man. I became really good at top of the line games like Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego?, and King's Quest IV. During my Spring Break (which did not correspond with the public school's February and April vacations), I spent some time at the doctor's office where my mother worked, and riding in my father's work truck, eating sandwiches while he fixed electrical wires and telephone poles.

On the third day with my father, I ate a runny Grilled Cheese sandwich that had decided that, since it had defeated my throat with its power of burnination, it was more than up for the challenge of destroying my colon. Despite my life-long dislike of public restrooms, I had no choice but to run into the restroom that my father's many coworkers shared, and purge my body of this greasy affront to cheesdom.

I knew this was going to be a multiple part bowel movement. At least a three minute project. Unfortunately, I'd left my copy of The Two Towers in my dad's truck, and the only thing in the stall with me was a Wall Street Journal. I picked it up, and out fell a glossy magazine with a scantily clad woman on the cover.  Club magazine.   I was ready to put the potentially offensive periodical back within the pages of the newspaper. I'd "read" through my father's Playboys, and hadn't found anything interesting aside from the joke section. Slim women with large breasts leaning over cars, or kneeling on beaches didn't do it for me. But the woman on the cover was not like the women in my dad's Playboys. She didn't look like the kind of girl who liked long walks on the beach, and dreamed of curing cancer, or becoming a veterinarian. This wide-hipped, huge nippled goddess had probably dropped out of highschool after her third abortion, and decided that stripping only provided temporary fame, while posing for porn meant that her nineteen year old pussy would live forever.

I flipped the magazine open. I marvelled at the way she squatted to the ground, a whip held tight in her teeth. In the background was a bright red motorcycle, and beneath her was...a huge cock. Sure enough, the next page showed her leaning over the motorcycle, while a guy in a visored helmet and nothing else pointed his cock in the direction of her mammoth ass. My butt clenched. I leaned over and checked the room for a pair of feet. I was alone. I folded the magazine back into the Wall Street Journal, ran it out to my father's truck, and zipped it into my backpack.