Inside and Out

I was so flaming mad at my dad when I introduced him to Shelby. She was my first "serious" girlfriend. Oh sure, I had only been with her for a few months, but I was sure she was the one. This is the thought that wakes me in the middle of the night. Are my children going to be as utterly stupid as I was?

Shelby complained afterwards that dad didn't like her. That's ridiculous I said. But it was true.

I called my step-mother Diana and let him have it by proxy.

"I can't believe he was so rude to her," I said. "He knows what she means to me. Why couldn't he at least pretend?"

"Because," Diana said, "he knows that she doesn't care about you the way she should."

Years later, and I mean years later, I introduced him to my fiance. This was different. I knew it. So much so that I never even considered that time before. Why did I punish myself time after time with dead-hearted women? Hands down in the back please. That was rhetorical.

Beth and Diana were happily chatting, looking over knick-knacks at a country store. My dad fell in beside me and put his arm around my shoulder. He was beaming. "She's beautiful Scott--inside and out."