Essay 3

All About Dad
“You can’t handle the truth!” yelled Gerry, my father, who was quoting Jack Nicholson while watching the movie “A Few Good Men” for the hundredth time. Gerry is a very laid back, rad dad. He can fix cars, and work with numbers as a CPA, meaning my father can do anything he sets his mind to. He is not a strict, overprotective father who wants his child home by a certain time at night and if he is not, he will get a severe punishment. His mustache is what makes him a unique, cool, calm and collected parent. We watch our favorite movies, complete my math homework, and bake delicious cookies together. He has a lot to offer with a big heart and cares a lot about the people he loves. He can make anyone laugh and is always willing to help. Baking, algebra, and fixing simple or complex problems are only a few of his many great qualities. He always wants other people to be happy and he will sacrifice anything to achieve that. My dad is the most selfless, motivated person in the world and I am grateful for him each day.
So, this is Christmas. This calls for a very special season, baking season. My dad does all the hard tricky parts like putting the dough together, and mixing the ingredients. I am his assistant. He gets his hands dirty in the kitchen working with the ingredients I pull out from each cabinet, while I press the cookies onto the baking sheets and place them into the oven. Our good old fashion Italian recipes are unique and creative. When it comes to baking around Christmas, every cookie is included. Butter cookies, Pignole cookies, Knots, Struvoli, Pizzales, Tarralle, and chocolate chip shortbread cookies are many of the items we bake each year. We have Christmas music playing in the background to get us into the Christmas spirit. My dad designates every Sunday leading up to Christmas as baking day. Our cookies are never burned because before they go into the oven, my father makes a cross with his hands over the tray. Dad always likes to get messy with it too by using his bare hands instead of a mixer. Once the cookies are in the oven and we smell them baking, my dad and I eat half of them before anyone else in the family can get their hands on them. After the butter cookies are finished which take hours, my father asks, “What should we bake next?” My reply is always, “Are you serious?”
Christmas Eve is always enjoyable when my family and I have our annual Christmas Eve feast. The feast consists of seven fishes, which we can sometimes have up to ten, and homemade Italian zeppole. My dad makes the zeppole dough in the morning for it to rise throughout the day since it has yeast in it. When it comes time to baking the zeppole, it takes a while for my dad to cook it. He slaves over the hot stove for hours with the oil burning and shooting up, trying to make the zeppole perfect. In addition, he breads the scallops, flounder, shrimp, and calamari, makes the shrimp scampi in the morning, and fries it all before dinner.
With my algebra homework in front of me I asked, “Hey dad, do you know anything about factoring trinomials?” My dad is a math whiz and can answer any question on any math matter. When I have math problems and I ask my dad for help, it takes twenty minutes to explain one problem. This is because he does not give up if I do not understand the problems I am given. He breaks down each equation into a much less complex form and once I understand that, we move onto a more complicated part of the problem. Since my father is an accountant, he knows everything and anything about arithmetic. He teaches me his old school methods, which are easier to go by than what I am taught in class.
Every night after I am finished doing my homework in my room, I run downstairs to indulge in my pistachio ice cream before I go to bed. Sometimes I hear my dad calling me from the television room, “Cara, get in here.” Once I hear this, I know one of my favorite movies is on by the semiserious yet comical tone in his voice. My dad and I recite quotes from movies in everyday conversations. When we are in a certain situation, there is always a quote that is appropriate to say to each other during this time. When someone in the house needs underwear, my dad and I say to each other, “I get my underwear at Kmart, 400 Oak Street in Cincinnati. These are Hanes 32, mine are boxer shorts they have my name, they say ‘Raymond’.” This is from the movie “Rain Man,” and my dad and I laugh after we say it to each other.
My father always wants to and feels it is necessary to please other people more than himself. If he hears I need to go to the library or my mother desires bakery cookies, there is no stopping him from going through with it. When it is his birthday, he does not choose the restaurant he wishes he lets his family decide. He is very easygoing, and is nonchalant about many things in life. On a Sunday night, when he sees I am in need of gas in my car, there is no hesitation. No matter the time of day, the kind of weather or how exhausted he is, he will go to Wawa and fill up my tank for school the next day. If one of my brothers needs an ink cartridge because the printer is out of black ink to print his research paper, dad will run out to Staples at ten at night just to get it.
My father possesses many talents including fixing cars and fixing electronics. On the third of November, my car had a leak causing it to smoke from the hood. Instead of bringing it to a car shop, my dad opened up the hood, found the problem and fixed it without a difficulty. When the computer is acting bizarre, my dad reworks it by opening up the hard drive and finding the problem, fixing it, and then putting it back together. He never fails and will not stop until the computer is fixed to his liking and perfection. No matter how difficult something may be to repair, he does not rest until it is corrected. He could change the world.