The Snack Incident

I’ve been writing down fragments of the past few weeks, mostly so my brain doesn’t pretend none of it happened. I don’t know if I’m writing another book or just trying to stay upright, but either way… the material is here. Pain is generous like that.

Sharing a bit below.

Would love your thoughts.….

At one point — somewhere between sneaking through the house like grief ninjas and trying to remember where every towel had originally lived — Kara and I made a colossal tactical error:

We ate in the car.

Not in his car, mind you. Not in the reliable 2001 Toyota he treats like a veteran war buddy.

We ate in the leased car. June’s car. The six-month-old pristine vehicle she treated like holy ground.

Dad saw us holding food and practically had a cardiac event in the driveway.

You’d think we were juggling lit cigarettes over a gasoline puddle.

He rushed over like, “NO NO NO, YOU CAN’T EAT IN THERE!”

We froze mid-bite.

Apparently, despite driving from Florida to Maine four times a year, June had a strict doctrine:

No eating in her car. Ever. Not even a mint.

So we asked him:

“How did you survive a 24-hour drive? No snacks? Nothing?”

Dad blinked, completely serious:

“We stopped to eat. Every meal.”

It was said with the gravity of someone announcing they crossed the Atlantic by rowboat.

Kara and I just stared at him, our forbidden snacks half-raised, suddenly understanding the depth of his conditioning. He wasn’t mad — he was traumatized. Forty-plus years of passenger-seat rule enforcement had rewired his soul.

Honestly, watching our grown father flinch at the sight of a cracker crumb was the first moment on that trip where we nearly laughed. Because grief has no respect for timing, and absurdity always finds a way in.