Chapter 4

Alan’s turn:

I just have to get it in my head that the women in my life, NONE of them fits into that neat little contemporary mold marked ‘normal’. Let’s start with my wife Tina. She’s more than twenty years junior to me, brilliant on any scale except perhaps the rarified world of our community, but we’re talking about a girl that achieved a baccalaureate degree at the age of nineteen. Make that a degree in electrical engineering. She’s on the ‘mommy’ track now, her choice.

Before I met Tina there was another marriage, a union that ripped me apart when it failed. The best part of that failure is my daughter Terri. Terri’s twelve now, a perfect (what dad doesn’t think his daughter is a version of perfection?) little blonde thing with a brain. Seeing her being twelve years old in venues with others her age, she looks like one of them. Well, maybe just a little more conservative in dress and a little more measured in mannerisms, but blonde, blue-eyed ... And it’s like having a plutonium core covered by a tea cozy. And a million dollars in the bank.

And then there’s the newest addition to the Addison crew, Katherine Genevieve, a joint collaboration of Tina and me, although Tina did all the heavy lifting. Kathy’s a year old now, walks, gets VERY frustrated because her motor skills don’t keep up with her mental acumen. She talks. Not that ‘mama dada’ stuff’. You have to hang on because a one year old mouth isn’t ready for an adolescent (at least) vocabulary.

Hoot of the day one day – I come home and Kathy’s in her little red wagon. EVERY kid in America should have a little red wagon at some point in life. Kathy’s got one. Kathy’s also got a big sister who is the keeper of Bot-bot, a robotic platform that has performed many tasks. Right at the moment I walked up, Bot-bot had the handle of Kathy’s wagon and Kathy was commanding him to pull her from one location to the next.

Kathy’s not unsupervised. Big sister Terri’s within a quick leap of her. Nor is she unaware, and she knows that Bot-bot takes voice commands. “Bah-bah, Stwaight” works. Then she sees me walking up. “Bah-bah, wight”, then “Dah-dee!”

Terri comes bounding up. “Bot-bot recognizes Kathy’s voice.”

“Google?”

“Uh-huh. They’re giving me some voice recognition blocks and I’m pushing the functions pretty hard. We’re pushing. I already sent a video of Bot-bot and Kathy.”

Google bought their way out of the munchkin inventions, drawing a bright line between the things that the munchkins had going with the Department of Defense and parallel work with Google. Terri and the gang are still in and out of both organizations as R&D. I want to say ‘engineers’ because I’m an engineer and I like to think that Terri’s obvious skills are hereditary, but she’s past plain ol’ engineering. In terms of pure intellect, if I’m a jet fighter, she’s a star destroyer. And the bubbly little thing commanding the robot over there may well be a Deathstar.

There is true heartbreak in being the father of a young girl. I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to face that until she was in her teens, but then I’d also, at one time, thought she’d go into college in her late teens as well. She’s IN college, at least in some strange, nebulous way, ergo, she’s also old enough, in her mind, to be serious about boys.

That is true heartache.

It could be worse. Might get that way, but I’m betting on my Terri and her stepmom and a very supportive and sane community.

Twelve years and two months. That’s a significant number because it marks a definite milestone in the transition of my Terri from girlchild to young woman. I walked into the house one day. Kathy was napping. Terri and Tina had serious looks.

“What’s up?” I asked. I’m leery. One time I asked that, we ended up with a covey of ultralight aircraft in the community.

“I’ll let our daughter tell you,” Tina said. That’s a happy thing. ‘Our daughter’. Tina has taken her role as stepmom seriously.

I looked at Terri. “You solved cold fusion?”

“No, Daddy,” she giggled.

‘Daddy’ tells me I’m being manipulated or it’s a happy milestone.

“I ... Uh, I am officially a woman.”

“Offcially,” I repeated. “Elaborate.”

“Without being graphic,” she said, “I know you notice changes. My clothes fit different. I’m getting THESE,” she said, putting her hands over the beginnings of actual breasts. “And I woke up this morning feeling gooshy. Dad, I am having my first period.”

I looked at Tina.

“You knew it was gonna happen sooner or later. I’ve been talking with Beck. We figured it was a horse-race between our daughters. We won.”

Now you need to understand that since Beck and Sim and Rachel moved into our old apartment building, Terri and Rachel have been inseparable. Two days later Rachel crossed into delightful precocious womanhood herself.

But my Terri ... That whole ‘boy-girl’ thing. She regularly interacts with others in her age range with the home-school group in which we participate. A lot of them are young boys, a growing concern to me.

One day I took a load of them to the library. I noticed a couple of boys plaguing my daughter. Well, they’re young adolescent boys, so they’re plaguing anything female, but my ‘daddy’ sense thought they were after MY daughter. I mentioned it that evening.

“Dad,” she said with a tone of ‘I can’t believe you even ask’. “Those are muggles.”

“She’s got standards,” Tina giggled.

“Oh, sure ... You both gang up on me.”

“He’s got to be smart, reliable, reasonably good looking, funny...”

“Like the guy I married, right, Terri?” Tina injected.

“Mmm-hmm...” affirmed Terri. She then smiled at me sweetly. “Like that.”

So she found that, at least in her estimation. I know the guy. If my daughter was ten years older, I’d be popping celebratory champagne. She’s not ten years older. It’s killing me.

Trouble is, I like the guy. He’s a bright young engineer in his own right, interned with us, worked with the girls on various mechanical parts of their robotics research and development. Mechanical engineer, but I don’t hold that against him. He’s honest and he’s moral and I can’t just shoot ‘im.

I have a good daughter. She talked to me. She talked to Tina. She talked to Cindy. Dana. Susan. Left Beck out for a while, then talked to her when Beck got the news via Terri’s best friend Rachel. And she talked to Dana.

And Dana’s great-grandmother. Who laid down the law. Of course, since Terri’d talked to Cindy and the gang, she knew in detail what the law said about twelve year old girls and twenty-two year old men and it was frightening enough.

Mizz Lee, though, honorable teacher to the girls, laid it out in terms of love and caring and endurance. So Terri knows. And Jerry’s in Houston, Texas and I know that email and Facetime are as close as they get, but they do stay very close.

Tina says there’s no sexual component to the conversations. I understand that both of them know the dangers.

I just wrote it off as being right there with the fact that my twelve year old daughter had a grasp of many college subjects better than the people who were studying them. Hah! In too many cases, she had a better grasp than the people ostensibly teaching them.

I just need to keep in mind that the women in my life are going to do the right things. That includes Terri. Trouble is that sometimes the right thing might be totally surprising.

Cindy’s turn:

If you didn’t already know, Mister Wally can get bossy at times. We made him the boss of 3S Aviation, the shell corporation that owns my big twin Cessna, Songbird, our little Cessna 150 that’s EVERYBODY’S trainer now, and ALL the ultralights. He’s a stickler for aviation safety, a fact that probably accounts for his surviving in the scary world of agricultural aviation.

He made us put a full set of strobes and radios on the ultralights. The trainer and Songbird already have that. He said, “It’s all about safety, and a big part of safety is making sure you can be seen, and that you can hear and talk to everybody. I will NOT be picking up body parts because you girls aren’t being safe.”

So yeah, the Munchkins can talk to each other, and any other aircraft in the pattern.

And now, hormones. Yup, we should have guessed, with all the time that they’re spending together, and they’re twelve. Terri and Rachel had their first periods, and starting the same week. Tina told me that Rachel came over for breakfast, and Terri grabbed her, and they just hugged each other and cried. So, all us “ladies” made plans and had a “ladies lunch” at the Desais’ that Saturday -- kinda packed out the party room. Flowers for Terri and Rachel, and small gifts from us all.

The entire point was to make it a celebration of sorts, and I think it helped them, a little. Wish I’d had something like this when I had my first period.

Anyway, about a week later, at the close of the afternoon lab, Terri said, “Aunt Cindy, can we talk for a minute?”

Uh-oh -- here it comes, I thought. “Sure, Terri. What’s up?”

“Aunt Cindy, I need to talk to Mister Charlie. Is there some way we can make that happen?”

“Umm, Terri, is this about Jerry?”

“Yes ma’am, it is. I don’t know what Mister Charlie can do, but I want to ask him.”

“Terri, there are two answers to your question. The first is, yes we CAN set you up with Mister Charlie. But the other, more important answer is that we can NOT set you up with Mister Charlie until Alan AND Tina personally tell me it’s OK with them.” I sighed. “Terri, I love you too much, and I love Alan and Tina too much to do anything without them being entirely in favor of it.”

She regarded me calmly. “OK, Aunt Cindy, I’ll talk to them. But I have to tell you, I need some firm answers, and all I’m hearing is ‘You’re too young’, and nobody will tell me how long I actually have to wait. I’m hoping Mister Charlie has some ideas about that.”

Crap. I REALLY didn’t want to get involved with all this. But the next morning, I met with Alan and Tina.

Tina said, “My view is that she ought to wait until age sixteen.”

“Unlike some of us, huh?” I opined.

Alan snorted and said, “My view is that she shouldn’t date until she’s about twenty-eight, and not have sex until she’s in her mid-thirties.”

We all chuckled -- the tension was easing a bit.

Then Alan said, “Cindy, you were married much too early, but it worked well for you because of Dan -- he’s a pretty unique guy. But Terri’s situation is very different than yours.”

“I know,” I said. “I had a whole different sort of family situation. So did Nikki and Dana.”

“Really, getting Mister Charlie involved may be a good idea,” Tina said. “He’s a judge, but he’s also a very good lawyer. More importantly, he’s a clear thinker, and Terri will respect anything he says.”

“Terri regards him as a worthy grandfather figure,” Alan admitted.

“OK, guys. Let me see if we can keep this low-key, and avoid any drama. Maybe I can go get Mister Charlie and Aunt Helen.”

And now, a phone call. Mister Charlie looks at his caller ID, I guess. He answered his phone, “Good morning, Doctor Cindy.”

I titter. He does that. Brags to his group of friends about his stepchild who’s got a PhD. He’s proud. I’m flattered that he cares.

He stepped in. “It’s great to hear from you -- what’s going on today?”

“Good morning Dear Grandfather. I have a little friend who needs some legal advice. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about the law, would you?”

He chuckled and said, “Well, maybe I can remember a few things. What kind of advice is she looking for?”

“Sir, it’s something you’ve probably never heard before. She’s under-age, and has decided that she wants to marry an older engineer. Actually, you’ve met her -- she’s the one we call Terri-dactyl.”

Mister Charlie laughed, and said, “I remember this part of the movie. I think the next line is: ‘Don’t go down into that basement -- there’s something down there with big teeth’.” He paused for breath. “But Cindy, is she serious?”

“Yes sir, she is, and we’re trying to formulate some answers that make sense to her. It’s a bit difficult, because she’s so smart -- smarter than me, for sure.”

“I’m not sure that’s possible, but I’ll take your word for it. OK, what’s your plan?”