Kinda funny. Between my freshman and sophomore year in college, back in '95, I had kind of an odyssey involving trucks breaking down, employers abandoning me in Riverside and 24 hours to get all my furniture and such 75 miles prior to classes starting. As such, I left my car in Seattle and drove the U-Haul to Bellingham, then returned the U-Haul, then had a car sitting at a U-haul lot near my uncle's house for two weeks. Anyway. A friend (whom I had fooled around with) and her friend (whom I had not) were heading south for the weekend and they could give me a ride to within about 20 miles of my car as they were stopping at the friend-of-a-friend's house. The plan was to call my uncle and try and get picked up to go get my car. However, my family is notoriously unreliable and nobody answered. So while I waited, the friend-of-a-friend's kermudgeonly dad glowered at me. I complimented some orchids I saw growing under a fluorescent light next to the dining room table. The friend-of-a-friend recommended I go out to the greenhouse to see her dad's orchids. They were impressive. He grudgingly showed me around for 20 minutes or so as I oohed and aahhed and tried to keep the paphs and phals straight. I'd never kept an orchid in my life. He also kept salt-water aquaria. I was impressed. He was cranky. My uncle never did answer the phone, but as cranky as he was, he recognized that the expedient solution was to drive my ass 20 miles to my car and back. He tried to make conversation, I tried to make conversation, but neither of us were great conversationalists. Those orchids weighed on my mind for years. I decided that raising orchids would be a cool thing to do. The friend drifted away, as did the friend-of-a-friend, but then I made a few changes in my life and reconnected with the friend. Two months later, the friend-of-a-friend. Nine months later she divorced her husband. Seven years later the kermudgeon paid for our wedding. They're my father-in-law's orchids. he used to grow them competitively. He still has a rippin' greenhouse full of 'em. I expect to take them over at some point soon as he's kinda sick of the labor. What are they? Uhh, the one in the front is a phal. The one in the back isn't. Beyond that, I could read the tag to you if it were in front of me, but it isn't. They're coming down in a week and a half. This is his favorite time of year for obvious reasons.
That's an awesome story, thanks for sharing it, glad you guys reconnected. Your daughter is lucky to have a grandfather that is the spitting image of Saint Nick himself. That's either going to be awesome or confuse the bajeesus out of her. They look like nice people though and given some of the stories I've heard regarding your upbringing, you could use some of those in your world at their level. Also, I can see your wife in her mom. It's amazing how excited grandparents get about their grandchildren. My parents are constantly skyping, trying to get us to visit etc and it has NOTHING to do with seeing myself or my wife. The power of the grandkid, it's impressive.