Loser x two

Saturday, 1:58 pm

By Kate

Jul

23

2005

Last evening Jo and I went out to dinner again. We usually try to do that twice a month - once for really cheap eats and once at another reasonably nice place. The place we settled on last night is a local favorite, off the beaten path and infrequently patronized by tourists. It’s once of those places that appeals to a wide age range. It has a homey atmosphere and the food is outrageously good.

Over the course of months, we’ve noticed a phenomenon that we’ve dubbed visitation dinners—fathers with visitation weekends taking their youngsters out to eat while their lives are still in the midst of a massive flux.

It’s kind of a sad commentary and I’m not even going to get into the whole bit on how I deeply loathe the term visitation.

But we’ve noticed a few things. There are some dads who are totally tuned in to their kids. Lots of conversation flowing and laughter and goofing around. There are some dads who look shell shocked (and probably are) along with kids who look so sad it makes your heart curl up its toes. Then there are the dads who are so completely tuned out as to make you want to walk over and smack them.

A dad and his young daughter, I’d say around 11 years of age, sat at the table next to us last evening. They were the spitting image of one another. Both well-attired and giving the impression of being fairly affluent. I’m not sure why that matters other than I would assume that people who have brains enough to be successful in life would have enough brains to figure out how not to be total idiots in public.

This man’s little girl was a beautiful child. Both in appearance and in behavior. And it was obvious that she adored her dad and wanted to engage him in conversation. He was so obviously bored by her attempts that it screamed from every pore. He ignored her conversation, he rarely looked at her, he glanced at his watch so many times that I wanted to rip it off his wrist. He interrupted her several times to say, “Come on, finish your dinner.” And finally, she went silent. She stopped talking, her face registered her hurt, and she visibly shrunk down into her chair and stole glances at him while she shoved the food around on her plate. When he was finished eating, he stood up and simply walked away. She got up and followed.

I cannot describe how sad I felt for both of them. He, apparently, not aware or caring what he was throwing away or how he was making his daughter feel and she for being so publicly humiliated. She clearly was embarrassed along with the other assorted emotions of knowing her daddy didn’t want to be there with her.

Damned fool.