I went shopping for birthday cards today. August is a month of a lot of birthdays of people who are rather important to me. It’s not just because my birthday is this month (if you don’t know the day, you might not be too intelligent. Hint: look to Flickr).

I bought my Dad a card with the following message:

(and Dad said) “If I have to turn around one more time — we’re going to drop you all off at the next rest stop and go on without you.” (his bark was always bigger than his bite).

Happy birthday, Dad
(and thanks for never leaving me behind.)

Even though the kids on the card are a bunch of gueros, I still bought it, because I could hear in my head my dad saying the exact same thing. However, most of the time we weren’t even far from home.

I don’t know how my Dad (and Mom) didn’t ever really lose his patience with us. With four kids all about 6 years in age difference, it was like a guarantee that we’d always be whining about something especially if we were crammed into a car.

There was one time when he got really pissed off at me. I was like 4 and I don’t remember it at all, but my Mom loves recounting the story.

We were on our way back from Mass one Sunday. Back then I got dressed up for Mass. I wore one of my many ruffly dresses, socks (or medias depending on if it was cold or not), ruffly chonis and shiny patent leather shoes. Neither I, my Mom, or my Dad have any idea about what why my Dad was mad at me or why I was mad at him. That’s irrelevent more than 20 years later. What does matter is that I was throwing a tantrum.

My parents didn’t hit me (I’m sure Gustavo would be glad to know), at least then. Instead, they took some advice from my Mom’s best friend and our neighbor, Mary Parra, a German-Filipina women married to a white man. Mary told them, when they throw tantrums, just stick them in the shower with cold water. Fully clothed, of course.

My Dad did just that.

And guess what? I screamed and yelled, “mi vestidoooo!” Dad got so pissed he just left the house for a few hours.

When I learned of that, I was pretty proud of myself. I’m sure my Dad expected me to be a handful, but the truth is I’ve been the non-squeaky wheel of the family. I just didn’t start off that way.

Dad never left us behind even after he stopped the car, instead, he just got back to driving because we always had somewhere to go and he wasn’t going to let his 4 whiny brats stop him and my mom from being there.

My Dad will be 52 tomorrow. ¡Feliz Cumpleaños!