to be continued...

So now you understand a little bit about my dad. Moving along, my dad hated his job, he had to drive 58 miles to work every day. Eventually, like after the third day, you get sick of the drive and start wondering why you took the job in the first place. My dad is an engineering genius, his business cards read Super, computer-fixing company-saving engineer extraordinaire. Well that isn’t entirely true, but they should say that. I guess they something more along the lines of Quality and Safety Engineer, I digress, my dad drives 58 miles to work every day to a job that he doesn’t really hate, he tolerates it, mostly because he makes a crap-ton of money for something that comes so easily to him. It would be like you or me making but loads of money for breathing, or peeing. Ok so my dad had finally, after 7 years of driving 116 miles every day decided to search for a new job. He interviewed at a bunch of places around Rochester, and things were looking up.
You are probably wondering what all this has to do with me moving, well trust me; this is all very crucial information as to why I am currently so miserable. It was one week until my sister’s wedding and my mom and dad come into the living room, my mom take the remote out of my hand and shuts the TV. off and says the dreaded four words that no person ever wants to hear… ‘we need to talk”. I’m thinking shit, what did I do? Raking my brain for something that could lead to her using the phrase that should never be uttered, I come up empty. The last time I heard that sentence it was 10 years ago when my parents told us that my dad had cancer. Now I’m starting to freak out, a week before my sister gets married my parents think it’s a good idea to tell me, the most emotional of all my siblings that my dad is dying.
Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you that I have a very active imagination, and that I am a bitter cynical pessimist who always assumes the worst…things to keep in mind. I’m already crying when my mom says “Oh god, you know” which in my mind solidifies my rightness and now I’m a wreck.
“You can come with us” my dad adds, and of course now I’m thinking, what is this, is he actually proposing a murder suicide?
Shocked, appalled and yet a little flattered, I ask “How long?”
“The 20th”
The 20th is just less than three weeks away. And now I’m thinking, wow modern medicine has really advanced, they can predict up to the exact day of death, that’s impressive, oh wait I’m supposed to be freaking out right now.
My dad adds, “Well I start the 20th, so probably the day before.”
Start? Since when do you start heaven? Isn’t it always happening, don’t you just walking in when you die? Or do you appear? I wonder how heaven works? Wow, ok so maybe I have a little ADD.
“What the hell are you talking?” I finally decide to ask, because I’m not a complete moron and I know that what they are talking about doesn’t exactly make sense if my dad were in fact dying.
“I got a job!”
“Holy crap, I’m retarded, congratulations!” I’m retarded; this is how I get myself into trouble, by always assuming the worst. And it’s nothing, actually it’s great, my dad won’t be so grumpy all the time now that he won’t be in the car for two hours of his day. Maybe I should ask him about his job so he thinks I actually care about what he does for a living. “So what is it?”
“Retarded, what? What are you talking about? Uh anyway, it’s at a company called Honeywell, they make……” Blah blah blah, I stop listening because I don’t actually care, but I add in an appropriately timed hmm, interesting and sounds cool dad! I have been faking it for 24 years; I’m basically a pro at pretending to care about stuff! Anyway he rambles on about stuff that I don’t care about, but mostly I don’t understand what he is talking about. My dad is too smart for his own good. He explains things as if the person listening to them is also an engineer, and then when, actually I should say if, he realizes they don’t understand he dumbs it down so that even a five year old could understand, and then they feel like he is treating them like they are stupid, well I shouldn’t generalize, I’m pretty much just talking about myself. Seeing as though both my siblings and their spouses are smart enough, in that specific area, to understand. So to compensate for the fact that I never understand a word my dad says when he is talking about his job, and to keep him from treating me like I’m an idiot five year old, I pretend to care and understand, when in reality I’m not actually even listening. But this time I should have really been paying attention because the next things I heard were moving and North Carolina.

more to come...