There’s a list of advantages to only spending weekends with the spouse.  Surprise visits is not one of them.

We have a running “joke”.  She occassionally texts me.

“Let me know when you are coming home, so I can tell my boyfriend to leave.”

Ha, Ha, Ha…  She thinks it’s fucking hilarious.  Like the death threats, it always makes me just a little nervous.

I used to tell my 9th graders,  it’s only funny when you are laughing with somebody — not at them.  That bullshit text is swimming across the border from with to at…

I came back to Gilbert on a Friday morning for a doctor’s appointment.  I forgot about it and didn’t tell The Bear.

Left Tucson at 5 a.m. — roll up to the house at 7 a.m..  I almost drove past.  There’s a strange new Subaru parked next to the driveway.

It’s not a Savage car.  No one in my family has a blue Subaru.  It’s got Oregon plates.

• WTF… the texts are not a joke?
• I’d feel a lot fucking better if it was a Miata…  but a god damn Subaru?
• Is the boyfriend the funny part?
• She did play college volleyball — have we been living a lie since 1984?
• Were the Savages right about her “female friends” all along?
• Am I the oldest and dumbest beard on the planet?

I may not want to see what the hell is going on in there.  Fuck that. I don’t care if everyone in the family calls it “her” house.  It’s my fucking house too.

If there is a “friend”, am I going to start kicking asses or just walk out and cry?  The Boy left a bunch of metal pipes in the garage (I don’t know what the fuck they are for).  I was  thinking about grabbing a pipe…

I leave it behind.

I walk in the door.  House looks like it always looks. Sounds like it always sounds.  The Bear comes down the hall half-dressed and surprised to see me — but not too surprised — just a mild “ohh you’re home early” kind of reaction.

I don’t sense anyone else in the house —  it’s just us. After what feels like a long enough pause, I ask, “Who’s fucking Subaru is that?”

“Ohh,” she said.  ‘That’s one of the Boy’s friend’s.  They were flying out for that bachelor party, and he needed a place to park.”

Punctuation is important here people — an apostrophe and a space make this shit a whole lot easier to swallow.  One of the boy’s friends is completely different than the boyfriend…

New Target

Then I switch targets for my old, white-man anger.

God damn douchebag millennials don’t know that dudes shouldn’t drive Subaru’s — it confuses us old folks.  If it had been a Mustang or a pickup truck, it would have been far less shocking.

And those cheap lazy bastards still lean on us for free shit — parking would have been $12 at the airport…

My fucking blood pressure is worth the $12. I would have paid the fucking parking fee to avoid this little surprise.

Note to self — always text the Bear when you are coming home.  If there is some funky shit going down in the city — I’m taking the Matrix blue pill (so to speak).  Better to be in blissful ignorance than to learn we have been living a lie for 35 years.

PS — can you guess the Springsteen “inspired” line/song for the headline?

If you can, you have wasted a significant portion of your youth. I’m looking at you Condo…