Preparations Part 1

Iced Tea Anyone?

I apologize in advance if my posts are all over the place this week.  I'm in the upward climb of the next hill on this roller coaster so things are a bit crazy.  For starters, my birthday is next week.  Normally I'd be pretty depressed about this.  Actually, I probably will be pretty depressed about this in the afternoon.  But this year I'm getting to see my first father in the morning on my birthday!  So I'm really excited and it gives me something to look forward to.  I'm sure that after he leaves, I'll be in my post visit haze (which is awful) and then I'll start to realize that my first mother didn't email (though I'm hoping that maybe he'll remind her it's my birthday and she'll get on that… I can dream right?).  And then I'll go back to being sad because I won't know when the next visit is going to be.  We met for the first time in March, then again in May, and nothing since then.  So it's sporadic  and neither one of us knows what the right formula is.  The joys of the guessing game...

So that plan as of right now is to show my first father around my home town.  Important sites to see:

1. The schools I went to - all five of them (unless I can't find one… the first school I went to is in the middle of a residential neighborhood and I was only five at the time so I have trouble finding it now).
2. The churches I attended (and the one I still attend) - he's super Catholic and I'm sure would appreciate that seeing as that was a condition that he had when picking my parents.
3. Where I used to play sports (soccer and softball) - he's really into sports and coaches my sisters' teams so he would probably appreciate seeing these places.
4. My street (and therefore my house from the street) - I don’t think he's going to be able to meet my mom because sometimes you don’t want to poke the bear (i.e. my dad) when you don’t have to.  Then again, I'm giving HER the choice because it's her life but I don't see her being up to it.  And my grandmother will be at the house… There's just a whole lot that could go wrong here…

Then we'll go back to the mall where I'm going to have him park his car and we can get lunch there.  I had a minor freak out about lunch.  This mall is sort of high end.  So even getting lunch there is expensive.  Not super super expensive, but expensive enough.  I don't mind paying for it because a) there's nothing else around and b) I have a job that pays so I don't mind.  My first father has a stricter budget that I do.  So it's a bit harder for him.  The first time we went out to eat I ordered a bagel.  So I didn't feel weird about him paying.  The next time we met up, he bought me an iced tea.  Again, not a big deal.  But a larger lunch would make me feel uncomfortable.  And there are no "small" lunches at this mall.  And we could try somewhere else, but there's seriously not a lot around that's cheap.  So I'm going to have to try to figure something out.  It's also my birthday, so I know he's not going to let me pay (for both of us or even for just me).

After lunch, he's going to head back home.  We don't have an absolute time line yet.  Earlier works better for him.  He has stayed until one in the afternoon before, so I'm hoping for a ten to one type of thing.  Three hours would be amazing.  Not sure if he can take that much time out of his life though.  That sounds horrible, but I get that he's really busy and that he has to sort of lie about where he is for the day.  He has to tell KungFuPanda that he needs the car for the day and make something up.  I'm not trying to make excuses for him, but it's not really his fault that the girls don't know about me yet.  And that this is a huge secret.  It's complicated and it's not just him that has to make the decision to tell them.  So I'm ok with that for now (or maybe I will be if I keep writing that out).

We'll see how this goes.  There's a lot that could potentially go wrong.  Stay tuned!

ETA: Link to Part 2