I phoned Papa and Eva to arrange to visit one weekend. "A friend is driving through Maryland on the way to visit family and he offered to give me a ride," I told them.

        "A man?" Eva asked. "What's his name?"

        "Mike," I answered.

         "And when will we meet him?"

        "He's just a friend," I said. "We're not dating."

        "Maybe that will change," Eva suggested. "You never know."

         "Anyway," I said, "if you can give me directions from the highway to the apartment – "

        Papa, who was on the extension, interrupted. "It's too complicated," he said. "Your friend will never be able to find us! But there's a convenience store just off the highway. I'll tell you how to get there from the Baltimore Washington Expressway. Then, when you get to the convenience store, call me and I'll come pick you up right away."

        "But, Papa, if you give me directions," I began.

        "No, it's much too difficult," he said, and that was that.

        On the Friday evening following that conversation, I called as instructed from the convenience store and then waited about ten minutes in Mike's car for Papa to arrive. Finally, he pulled into the lot, parked, and climbed out of his car. He was wearing an old jacket, a wool cap, and had his hands shoved into his pants pockets.

        I opened the car door and waved. "Hi, Papa," I called.

        "There you are!" He came quickly to my side and gave me a sloppy wet kiss. Meanwhile, Mike got my suitcase out of the trunk. Without a word to Mike, Papa grabbed the suitcase. "Anything else to carry?" he asked me.

        "No, Papa," I said, "That's all, but –"

        "Then we'd better get going! Eva's got dinner ready," Papa said. He hadn't even acknowledged Mike's existence.

        "But, Papa, I'd like you to meet my friend Mike!"

        Papa turned and glanced at the fellow. "Hello, Mike," he muttered. "There, I've met him," he told me. “Are you satisfied now?”

        "It's nice to meet you, sir," Mike said to Papa's back, as Papa stalked away to his own car with my suitcase.

        When we got to the apartment, Eva greeted me smiling, wooden spoon in hand. "Your friend didn't follow you over?" she asked.

        "No," I said. "He has  a good drive still ahead of him."

        "Well, what was he like, Pat?" she asked, turning to Papa. But before Papa could respond, Eva gasped. "Just look at you, Pat! Why did you wear those ratty old pants? And the jacket with the hole in it, Pat!" She turned to me. "I keep telling him he has to get rid of that jacket, but he just won't do it!"

        "Hmphh!" Papa said.

        "How could you, Pat! Dressing like that and embarrassing your granddaughter  in front of her friend!"

        Papa's voice rose to the occasion. "I don't see why I have to get dressed up to meet some young fool!"

        "Pat!" Eva positively shrieked.

        “What?” he grunted.

        "You're not wearing your teeth! You went to meet the young man and you weren't even wearing your teeth!"

        "He doesn't give a damn about my teeth! He doesn’t care what I look like! He just thinks about what she looks like!" Papa shouted, pointing at me.


        "Didn't even wear your teeth!" Eva said as she went back to the kitchen. "What that young man must have thought of you!"

        "Hmphh!" Papa answered.

        On Sunday evening, when it was time for me to return to the convenience store to meet my ride home, Eva supervised Papa's attire before we were allowed to leave the apartment, and she made sure that he was wearing his teeth. He was, however, no more interested in speaking with Mike than he had been on my arrival.

        After my return to Philadelphia, I called my mother to tell her about the weekend. "Papa acted terribly to my friend!" I complained.

        When I told her about it, my mother laughed. "Well, it wasn't as bad as the first time Papa met your father."

        "No?"

        "The first time Dad asked me out, I was 14 years old," my mother said. "My older brother brought home his friend, Jackie Lydon, and I thought Jackie was dreamy. But it was almost a year before he asked me to go to the movies with him! I was so excited! At the time, Papa was working and living in New York, so I asked my mother for permission to go to the show with Jackie. She said, 'You'll have to wait until your father comes home this weekend, and get his permission.'

        "Well, when Papa got home, I told him that Pat's friend Jackie had asked me to go out to the movies, and could I go?

        "'Who is this man who wants to take my little girl out on a date?' Papa asked.

        "'He's not a man, Papa,' I told him. 'He's a boy at school. He's a friend of my brother's.'

        "'And how old is he, Baby?' Papa asked.

        "'He's seventeen, Papa,' I explained.

        "'Seventeen!' Papa said. 'Then he's a man. And if this man wants to take my little girl out on a date, I have to meet him before I can even think of giving my approval!'

        "So Papa told me to have Jackie come over early Sunday afternoon to meet him, and we got it all arranged. But then Sunday morning, after breakfast, Papa sat down in his boxer shorts to read the newspaper with a cup of coffee and a cigarette. And he kept reading, and kept reading, and it was getting later and later and later.

        "Finally I said, 'Papa, please put on your pants!'

        "And he said to me, 'Can't a man relax in his own home?'

        "I said, "Please, Papa, Jackie Lydon is coming soon! Please put on your pants!'

        "'I don't have to get dressed up for some young whippersnapper!' Papa said.

        "Well, I begged and pleaded, but Papa just sat in the parlor in his boxers reading the paper. Finally, when it was time and your father came to the house to meet Papa and get permission to take me to the movies, I had to bring him into the parlor and introduce him to Papa who was still sitting there in his underwear! I was so embarrassed!"

        "What happened then?" I asked.

        "Oh, Papa grilled your father on what his intentions were, and your poor father was so shy, it was terrible for him. But then, of course, your father thought that Papa was awful to sit around like that in his underwear in front of his daughter. But in the end, Papa finally gave his consent, provided that my brother went along too to chaperone us. Your father and I spent the next year trying to avoid my brother in the movie theater, because my brother and his friend used to sit behind us making kissing noises through the whole movie!"

        After that first time, Mike continued to give me rides to Laurel on occasion, and eventually was permitted to drive me to the apartment instead of my having to call from the convenience store. But although Eva tried to chat and quizzed the young man when possible, Papa never favored him with much more than the occasional grunt or harrumph. To Eva's delight, Mike and I even began dating.

        "You should invite him to stay with us for the weekend!" Eva suggested.

        "I don't know," I said.

        "Your Poppa and I are mature adults," Eva said. "We understand that young people want to spend some time alone together. We wouldn't have any problem with that. We'd stay out of the way!"

        It was a kind offer, although it was hard to imagine Papa and Eva staying quietly “out of the way.” I declined; I preferred to keep Mike's exposure to Papa limited.

        Once, when Mike and I had gone out for an evening on the town in D.C., he brought me back to Laurel after midnight, and Papa and Eva had already gone to bed. Papa was always a light sleeper and was prone to wandering the apartment during the night. I have no idea how she was able to do it, but Eva kept Papa confined in their room until after Mike had left.

        On one weekend, when Mike came to drive me home on a Sunday evening, Papa carried my suitcase out and deposited it in Mike's car, while I tried to keep Eva from packing as much food as she thought I'd need to bring home with me. When he came back into the apartment, Papa took me aside.

        "There's a bottle of wine in that car," he informed me in whispers.

        "A bottle of wine?"

        "A bottle of wine!" Papa repeated. "And it's been opened! I don't like the idea of a man coming to pick you up from your grandparents' home with an open bottle of wine in the car. What kind of man does that?"

        "It was probably left over from something, Papa," I said.
        "I don't like it," Papa said. "Are you going to be safe? I don’t want you to go with him if you won’t be safe. I can take you to the train."

        "I'll be fine, Papa."

        "I don't want him drinking with you in the car," he said.

        "He won't, Papa."

        "You make sure he doesn’t, and you call us when you get in, and let us know you got home in one piece," he said. And of course, I did call a few hours later when I arrived safely home.

        When Mike and I stopped seeing each other, Eva was sympathetic. "Oh, that's too bad," she said.

        "Too bad? Hmmphh! Like hell!" Papa said.

        "What do you mean, hmmphh, like hell?" Eva demanded.

        "What do I mean? She's better off without him, that’s what I mean!" Papa said. "I didn't trust him from the first time I saw him!"

        "Well, that's just silly, Pat! How could you know anything about whether you can trust someone from just looking at him?"

        Crossing his arms over his chest, Papa leaned back in his chair. "I could tell,” he said. "I knew. I just knew!"


Biographical Note: Kate Lydon is a storyteller, writer and editor who at times hires out as an adjunct professor. She grew up along the rocky coast of Massachusetts, but has lived most of her life amid the trees of Pennsylvania.   Daughter of a man who made the best donuts in the world and a woman who acted out Macbeth and read poetry for her children, Kate is the oldest of five, and thus is prone to giving advice. However, her husband, two children, two cats and one dog, independent souls all, pay scant attention, and so she writes. Kate’s satirical murder mystery, Off Center, is now available through Amazon’s Kindle Store. She is currently working on another novel, as well as a book of stories about visits her grandparents Papa and Eva.  See the Author Index for Prose L-Z  and the Author Index for Poetry for more of  Kate's writing.