I had dinner with my father last night at his retirement home. It’s a stately, double-winged, four-story brick and ivy manse with a curved driveway out front. Inside are multiple libraries—fiction, non-fiction, history, periodicals— and various sitting and dining rooms. The carpets are large prints of the kind hotels might choose to hide stains, but less jazzy, more academia than Vegas strip.
Lining the staircases are balustrades of turned white oak. More balustrades, atop half-walls of carved, solid oak, divide the sitting rooms and the large, main dining room, which also boasts the kind of fireplace a deerhound could walk into. It is filled with four-top tables, and the residents are seated to ensure that no one eats alone. Those preferring solitary meals can have their food delivered to their rooms.
It was at one of those four-tops, reserved for just the two of us, that my father and I were eating dinner. He chooses his wine first, and then which meal to have with it depending on his mood for red or white.
That he drinks white makes me want to disown him, but we tolerate the intolerable from those we love.
“Now this place would make a great setting for a murder mystery,” he said.
“I wonder if everyone would know it was the salt that did it?” I responded.
He decided on a red wine and the pasta bolognese. I got a Greek salad.
“No soup?” Carmen, the server, worries.
“No, thanks Carmen. The salad will be fine.”
“But with chicken, yes? Or an egg? How about some Naan bread?”
I was going to lose this, as I always do.
“Thank you, an egg and some Naan will be great.” I turned to dad.
“Naan bread is bread bread.”
“What?” He really needs to wear his damn hearing aids.
“Naan means bread. So saying Naan bread is saying bread bread, like saying shrimp scampi is saying shrimp shrimp.”
Sometimes the depth of our conversations stuns me.
“I don’t think you can murder people with Naan bread,” he said. He can be very single-minded.
“Pffff. You can murder people with anything if you put your mind to it. You know, Cousin Amanda, friend Jill and I were going to start a murder mystery series.”
“Were you!”
“Yup. Each new episode would start out with the crime scene, but here’s the kicker - it would always be one of us that did it. The whole episode would be spent figuring out which one of us it was.”
“I think I should be the one who does it.”
“Every time?”
“Yes.”
“I think we have to talk about the ‘mystery’ aspect of this idea, dad.”
“Ahhh, but you’ll have to guess what I did it with!”
“I’m… not sure that’s quite the challenge you think. Unless they all die of cholesterol poisoning,” I picked slices of hard boiled egg off the salad, only two eggs this time. Last time they gave me four. “How do they not kill everyone here with their egg portions?”
“Just think of all the places here to investigate! Libraries, kitchens, hallways…”
I pictured slow motion chase scenes of suspects pushing walkers, and people hiding behind doors shouting “WHAT” to others hiding with them.
“Do you worry that you’d fall asleep mid-murder? You do nap a lot these days.”
“Well, that’s always a possibility.” He chuckled.
“I think as long as the detective is also a resident it’ll be OK, because they’re just as likely to fall asleep mid-solving it.”
“Probably we should make the detective Dick L. He remembers everything.”
“Well that seems like a bad idea, dad. What if he wakes up and remembers it was you?”
“Oh good point. Let’s make him the first victim!”
It’s so nice he’s making friends.
Morning Teaistisms
We made it to March. Though this has been a mild winter, it’s been such a long one. We have at least a week of rain ahead here in the Northeast, with some snow possible.
I think that’s the “coming in like a lion” part. What an annoying lion.
Mem Tea’s White Peach white tea is delicious and light and promises spring, while still offering warmth and body. It’s got rose petals and dried peach, and some citric acid that adds a tiny bite to it.
It’s also very pretty.
Love it!!! A realistic Clue game with Dad as the culprit!!!! Love that guy!!!!!
WHAT??