"Estelle's lola just bought a couple hundred dollars' worth of groceries. Just tell me how many people are coming to her birthday party, and lola will handle the cooking," your lolo -- your grandpa -- said.
Your mom started an invitation list. Ladies from her Mommy Group, former coworkers from the congressman's office, volunteers from the 20-30 Club, a good friend in the Ashland Police Department, members of her church prayer circle, your mom's mom and dad, and of course the aforementioned lolo and lola.
Your dad started a list, too. It started with a pinata, and immediately ended with Filipino food. And since lola would be handling the cooking, half of your dad's list was checked off the moment he wrote it down.
Your dad never had a pinata at one of his own birthday parties. Only at friends' birthday parties. But he loved them. It was one of the few times his childhood kung fu training served him well. Trained from third grade until high school in the use of tai chi swords and Chinese broadswords, people always told your lolo that he was crazy for letting his kid use swords. Then those same people would prop a rifle in the back window of their pickup truck and take their child out to hunt deer and elk. So your lolo thought it was alright if his son learned how to swing a little more martial weapon.
One time in the Navy, your dad was invited to a shipmate's niece's quinceanera. There was a beautiful young girl in a white dress, and there was a yellow Pokemon pinata. Your dad, typically uncomfortable in family-and-friend gatherings in which he was neither family or friend, acted his typical self and stood with his hands in his pockets at the party's fringe. The San Diego parkland was all dark green and light green, leafy and grassy. The quinceanera girl's dad, along with two or three of her uncles, strung the Pokemon pinata up between two trees. The kids, maybe a dozen of them, gathered expectantly. There would be lots of candy on the ground soon. But first, there would be a good old fashioned pinata beating.
"You, you'll go first," the quinceaera girl's dad said. And he handed your dad a bat.
"No. Oh no," your dad said. "I can't go first."
"Sure, sure, you're our guest. Please, I insist. You'll go first."
Your dad loved pinatas. His politesse lay in a trampled heap underneath his desire to swing blindfoldedly at a yellow, candy-stuffed Pokemon character.
The blindfold went on and the quinceneara's dad spun him around. Six, seven times. Eight, nine times. He stopped spinning your dad around and your dad immediately snapped his head back in the opposite direction -- a trick he'd also learned in kung fu. Immediately, your dad's dizziness stopped. He held the baseball bat in front of him, stance wide, breathing slow. He simply stood there for several moments not moving.
Then your dad turned ninety degrees to his right, lunged his left foot forward, and swung the bat at eye level.
BAMPF. Your dad was immediately pleased and horrified. In one fell swoop, the Pokemon was halved, and the candy blasted out in a sugary rainbow onto the grassy San Diego parkland lawn.
Your dad pulled the blindfold up and off his head. The baseball bat drooped in his grip and then dropped to the ground. The children, somewhat mirthlessly, walked quietly around him and picked up candy. Your dad looked over at his shipmate that had invited him and shook his head slowly like, I'm sorry.
Your dad set the blindfold onto a corner of a picnic table as he walked back toward's his shipmate's car. He sat in there for the rest of the party.
