Travels with my Father

So my yearly exodus from NYC to the promised land of Miami has finally come to pass.

With a slightly orange residual tint from my collision with my spray tan gun(which should have a surgeon general's warning on it) I arrived at the airport at 9:15 am for the 11:00 am flight from Laguardia to Miami.

You may ask yourself "Why would she show up close to two hours prior to a domestic flight; Which is a perfectly rational query. The answer? My father, who is the chasidic version of any character Jerry stiller played on TV..on steroids. (Yeh,let that marinate in your head a bit before we move on.)

My mother is the perfect "straight woman"!She remains semi-silent and pretends to be embarrassed and /or whispers softly something that continues their romantic tango of building up to a crescendo (a more prolific way of saying "pours salt on the wounds") that anyone within fifty feet can experience, Like audience participation at a show.

This is how it went down:

I pull up in a cab at the curbside checking area of Delta Airlines. My parents have been there ten long minutes before me. Before I can even close the door to the cab and take my luggage out, my father leaps like a twenty year old to grab my stuff. He looks extremely irate, like when my mother doesn't let him eat rugelach and rum balls, which he hides in various places and bakeries throughout Brooklyn. He is known to make them sign a non disclosure in case my mother opens a federal investigation and follows the trail of crumbs to a smoking gun, which then leads to a messy confrontation, where my father unsuccessfully tries to eat the evidence. That's how he looked as he shouted,

"Uch!! We're late now ! Let me take it to the guy here."

He heads towards the porter behind the curbside checking counter and is ignoring a couple of tall black brothas with lots of musical equipment standing there. To my delight it's "earth, wind and fire" so I shrug my shoulders, apologize and restrain myself from singing "Boogie Wonderland"'

One of the guys smile and says "We have a lot of stuff here, you probably should go to another station". I reply " Forty five years you guys have been together, like a marriage. That's miraculous, like the parting of the Red Sea, which is what we are celebrating this holiday. ( I almost sang " celebrate " but realized it was the wrong 70s band)

"Those are your parents? They're so cute"!

My parents didn't hear the conversation because they were already on to the next porter who "claimed" my luggage was overweight, which lead to more drama. In order to assuage my father I quickly took some stuff out and squeezed it into my carry-on. It was 9:45. We were now in emergency mode and quickly squeezed on the crowded security line. My father runs straight to the screener and agitatedly states,

"We're gonna miss our flight, we need to get through this quickly"

"Sir, you have plenty of time". She assures him.

Of course the screener stopped me and went through my carry-on where they threw out my deodorant in a spray can. I hear a familiar voice.

"Who brings a spray deodorant in a carry on"

 I, obviously do. Is that a crime somewhere?

My mother chuckles.

My father segues to the next subject.

"You have your boarding pass"

"Yes".

"Where is it?"

 I know from previous excursions, that I need to show it to him without delay or my mother will be broadcasting the conversation on our family's what's app group with various emojis, some of which are very inappropriate. ( she's a newbie)

"I have it. Here. Ok?" I tell my mom that I need to use the restroom. I begin to look for the nearest one to our boarding gate.

"Where's she going. They're boarding soon!"

I yell out "don't worry I'll be right back ".

The flight was delayed for 45 minutes and my father didn't make a peep all the way to Miami:). I love him