One Chicken Enchilada Con Pollo, Por Favor

It wasn’t until I was 24 years old that I finally realized my dad was a real human being. I am my father’s daughter, and I have selective hearing. I grew up half-listening to him, and would only choose to respond to his pestering remarks about my skiing technique, study habits, the people I hang out with. If you can believe it, the list goes on. 

I would take everything personally. In my head, he was in my life to nitpick every aspect of what was wrong with me. This didn’t feel good as a teenage girl. We’d get into arguments, screaming matches, and just one time, a physical match where I pushed him away from me. Sometimes we’d go a day or two without talking after a fight. I’d sulk in my room, resenting him for being so selfish. 

As I grew older, I slowly became aware of how similar we were. There were the good things we shared in common, like skiing, movies, fine dining, and 70’s music. But there were the ugly things too. In my relationships, I would catch myself falling into jealous tendencies that mirrored some of the ways my dad had responded to my mom over the years. I found myself growing hot-headed when I was stressed, biting at anyone that had good intentions, and I’d remember my dad’s similar anxious tendencies. 

All of these observations made him feel like a broken puzzle. In my head, he was still a parent that had only been alive since I was born. It wasn’t until our trip to Utah that I started to put the pieces of his life together. 

The road trip was 17 hours, and we talked the entire way with music quietly playing in the background. Somewhere in the middle of the Pine Ridge reservation, he started giving me song suggestions. He called them his “mellow listening” tracks. The songs ranged from Seals and Crofts and Peter Frampton, to Shawn Colvin and the Allman Brothers. The sweet sounds of guitar and amazing songwriters filled the car as the landscape opened up before us. We wound through small limestone canyons and disheveled farmsteads. The whole time he commented on how beautiful it was. 

We reached Salt Lake and spent the week going to movies at Sundance Film Festival and skiing in the Cottonwood Canyons. One night, I convinced him to get KBBQ and we went and stuffed our faces with marinated beef and veggies. At the dinner, he told me about how he had been married before he met my mother. This woman was a European he’d met in South Africa, and it was a green card marriage. “You know all those stories about me living in Europe after my Africa trip? That’s what I was doing,” he said. 

At first, I was nauseous, and for a second, he felt like a stranger. He noted that this ex-wife had been around nearly 40 years ago. 40 years ago! He talked about how he had dealt with some severe anxiety issues throughout his life, and that period was during one of them. 

We went to dinner the next night at the Red Iguana 2 (yes, there is more than one), and I was feeling slightly uneasy. My dad ordered a shot of tequila and a beer, and asked the waiter close to one million questions about the menu. He started using the global accent that my mom and I have made fun of him for my whole life. At any ethnic restaurant, he subconsciously slips into an undefined accent when speaking with the waiters. It doesn’t help that he thinks he knows some Spanish. 

When the waiter came back for the order, my dad said “Yes, could I please have one chicken enchilada con pollo, por favor?” The waiter repeated it back to my dad with a twinkle in his eye, and it took a second before my dad broke into laughter. 

Of course, I was beyond mortified, but my anxiety around the news that my dad had broken to me the day before lifted. As we bickered about how badly he needs to get rid of the infamous global accent, I finally realized that this is my dad, and he has always been human. He has quirks, and stories, and personality traits that were all built around things that came well before I did. Despite all of his annoying traits, he has a burning passion for life and the people he loves. He has overcome so much, likely much more than I know about. Who am I to judge, if that’s the case? 

The waiter brought us our food, and it was quite possibly the best Mexican food I’ve ever had. We ate in silence, only commenting on the quality of the sauces and the meal. When I finished, I let myself sit and enjoy the moment, giving thanks for my dad and the human he is.