How can you say no or parents are really good at lying….
Parents must take acting classes as part of the secretive manual everyone is not talking about. What manual? Oh, if you haven’t gotten the manual yet then you are not part of the club. There is an entire chapter to getting away with those lies that preserve the sanity of the family.
Our was on a trip to Florida, where the family would pile into the cadillac (my father was a Cadillac sales man, we were that family with no money but a brand new cadillac parked in the driveway) and drove down to Florida for our yearly Disney trip. Mom and Dad in the front with us kids piled in the back or sometimes, Mom and Dad and my littlest sister in the front, with us three kids with ugh! Grandmom in the backseat - I think this was done to keep us in line. (She always threatened to touch us with her dentures if we didn’t behave on the trip)
Which made us little angels.
For a little while.
My father’s acting skills were called into question on one of those Florida trips, sweating on the leather seats, playing the slap game, pulling each other’s hair until our parents couldn’t take it anymore and the shining oasis of the highway appeared.
The roadside zoo.
As kids we didn’t notice that technically, it was in someone’s back yard, and most of the animals look like really tired farm animals, but everybody grabbed the brass ring and piled out of the car for “the zoo.”
This obviously was before the days of PETA because two of the major attractions for at the zoo were the “drumming duck” and the “dancing chicken.” The only two in the zoo that cost money, of which we begged my Dad for money, over…..and over….and over...again. Now, as an adult, I kind of feel sorry for the chicken because obviously he was standing on a hot plate and each quarter fed into the lmachine, turned the plate on and made him “dance.” The road side zoo was probably some place for washed up street performing animals thinking they were going out to pasture but ending up on hot plates and such.
I found the monkey while my brother and sister were up to $16 on the “dancing chicken.". The monkey was in a little cage hidden in the back. A small spider monkey, brown, with very sad looking eyes, sort of like a little squirrel but with a much longer tail and better agility. He looked so excited to see me, he jumped from a tree in the back of the cage to the front.
It was almost like serendipity because just as he reached his little hand between the bars of the cage and touched my hand, I looked up and noticed the “For Sale” sign.
We were meant to be. I could see it now.
We would be best friends. He could sleep next to me in the bed. Ride on my shoulder on my bike. I’d teach him how to use the toilet, he could sit next to me at the dinner table.
In that single touch I saw an entire future with Toby and me - my new best friend.
One problem.
I had no money.
But I had parents.
I ran and pulled my Dad over to the monkey cage, “Look Dad! He’s for sale!”
My Dad looked in the cage, watched the monkey take some feces from his butt and fling them to the bottom of the cage, then look over to me. I’m sure my Dad for a second, thought, “well, $20 in pretty cheap” but then common sense took over, he could see the monkey throwing feces around the car, wiping it on the leather seats, biting us, spitting in my mother’s face. I only saw my best friend.
“I’ll take care of him, I’ll do EVERYTHING. You don’t have to worry about anything! I’ll clean him, and make clothes for him, he’ll sleep in my room, you won’t even know here’s there! PUUUUHHHHLLLEEEAAASSEEEE?”
The monkey, as if on cue, reached out and his tiny fingers wrapped around my finger as if sealing the bond.
At this point most Dads who haven’t read the secret parenting manual would think, “I am screwed. This damn monkey is going to ruin my vacation because said child is going to be crying about how evil I am for not freeing him from his cage for only $20.”
I’m watching my Dad, thinking that I may have an “in” that he is mulling it over.
He’s thinking of a way to get out of it. “Let’s go look at the other animals.”
Thinking I need to be an angel to get my monkey, I follow him through the zoo. Looking at some very tired bears snoring under a tree. Petting a miniature horse, I say, “He’s too big to put in the car, see the money is so much smaller.” My Dad sighs.
We end up back at the monkey cage, and I am pulling out all the stops, I am not crying about how we are already best friends, and I can’t leave my best friend behind! My brother has finished his $20 in quarters with the chicken and is walking over, “Cool! A Monkey.”
Toby, throws some feces at my brother and I’m saying to my Dad, “He’s just kidding with John. I told him that he won’t give me any of his candy on the drive.” I look over to the monkey, “Toby, be a good monkey!”
I’m thinking maybe I have him, that I am taking my best friend home when my father pulls the white lie out of his butt, sort of like the monkey pulling the feces from his own. But it the perfect lie, it dashes my hopes, gives him a reason for not buying the monkey, and keeps everyone happy.
“The hotel down in Florida doesn’t allow monkeys, honey. What would we do with Toby for 2 weeks?”
I stop crying and think for a minute, hmmm, what will we do with him for 2 weeks? Friendships like the ones in Middle school sometimes are not meant to be, “Oh man, maybe we can stop here on the way back and buy him?”
My Dad brightens up, “Yes, maybe.” In his mind he’s thinking, “hell no.”
I grab his hand, loving my Dad for thinking about buying me a monkey, wave goodbye to Toby, “Goodbye Toby.” He’s too busy picking his nose, he turns away.
That’s how Dads do it, they preserve the family dynamic with a small lie here and there. They want to give their children everything but are the voice of reason, thinking through all those things that us Moms just jump right into. The ying to our yang.
As we walked out the front of the zoo, my brother looks into the chicken booth, “Hey look! The chicken laid an egg!”
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