Father’s Day is rapidly approaching, which means that the media is full of nauseatingly helpful advice on the perfect gifts guaranteed to make the old man smile.  In truth, most of us Dads don’t want gifts, really don’t need anything, and would probably just like a hug and the car washed.  But that’s because us lucky ones do get great gifts from our kids, it’s just that the presents usually arrive when you least expect it and not because of a date on the calendar.

A while back, my family and I were vacationing for a week at the beach.  One night while strolling down the boardwalk looking for a place to have dinner, we came across one of those open-air, picnic tabled, Tiki-torched eateries that seemed to overflow with local charm.  We checked the menu posted near the entrance: hamburgers, chicken fingers, Caesar salads, our kind of food.  And the prices were good; dinner for five wouldn’t be cheap, but nothing to break the budget.  Being the frugal guy I am, I loved it.

Walking in, we were led not downstairs to the casual beachy section that had caught our eye, but upstairs, to a rather stuffy indoor fine-dining experience, replete with shiny artificial foliage and automated tropical birds.  I started to smell a rat.

Once seated, I opened the menu with trepidation and scanned it.  Now, I don’t know exactly where a Mahi-mahi comes from, but the one on the menu must have arrived in its personal limo.  I shrugged.

By now, there wasn’t much I could do and I didn’t want to embarrass anyone.

But then my daughter spoke up.

“Everything here is way overpriced.”

She looked at my wife.  “This isn’t the menu we saw outside.”

We realized that we had been admitted to the wrong part of the restaurant: the section where the culinary elite gladly fork over twelve bucks for a couple of cantaloupe wedges.

“I am not letting you pay this much for dinner,” my daughter added.

My younger son put down his menu.  “At these prices, you’d think they’d have something I’d like.”

“What can we do?” I asked.

My older son joined in and immediately hatched a plan, something he called “the trickle.”

“We sneak out one at a time, then they won’t notice anything.  I’ll even go first.”

My younger son suggested we just get up and leave, pointing out that they legally couldn’t stop us.  My daughter proposed that we fake some sort of intestinal illness so the waiter would be glad to see us go.

Eventually, the kids just decided we’d make a run for it.  So, we rose as one and bolted, eyes fixed on the door and the vision of financial freedom beyond.  Almost knocking down our waiter who was coming out of the kitchen, I mumbled something about, “Kids, upset stomach, you know how it goes.”

Later, we found a little restaurant up the beach that made great Italian subs.  Maybe I liked it so much because I enjoyed it with three kids who are happy to help save me a buck or two—or more—every once in a while and aren’t embarrassed to do it in a crowd.  And really, who could ask for any gift better than that?

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