Baby just say yes

Even if—especially if—I, er, YOU, I MEAN YOU wind up dancing in the aisle at the Taylor Swift movie

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A friend I haven’t seen in years asked me via text recently how I was doing. I started to peck out that I’m doing good, my wife is good, my girls are growing like weeds … but as I finished that note, I realized it’s not true.

In fact, one of them is done growing and has been for a couple of years, and the other one is close to done, too, if not done.

They’re not even girls anymore.

That made me want to curl up in a ball and cry.

It also made me want to say yes—yes, yes, yes, to everything they ask, because it won’t be long before they’re going to stop asking.

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Nobody I have ever met models saying yes to the right things more than my friend Andy.

Andy and I bonded at first over the fact that our daughters were born on the same day, just a few hours apart. As they played at the park that was equidistant between our houses in a Charlotte subdivision, we spent hours many Saturdays talking about this, that and the other. 

One day, I said, “Hey, me and a few friends are doing a few days on the Appalachian Trail. Do you want to go?”

And that simple question changed both of our lives.

I didn’t know him as well as I do now, so I didn’t think he’d say yes … shows what I know. He did, and in the last dozen years, he has done so repeatedly. He has gone with me on adventure assignments to Tennessee, North Carolina, New Mexico, Missouri, California and most recently he rode shotgun as I played bumper cars all over the UK.

He keeps a bucket list on his phone, and I take great pride in the fact our trips help him check items off. In Yosemite National Park, it was “hug a Sequoia.” In England, he got to see his beloved ManU play live and in person. Not only that, but it was an all-time great game; ManU scored two goals during stoppage time to win 2-1. “I was hugged and kissed by drunken men,” he texted me.

That’s a strange way to be blessed, but it was a blessing indeed, for both of us. He can add unwanted intimate contact to the list of things we’ve survived on adventures he said yes to, a list that now includes whiteouts, ferocious thunderstorms, blistering heat, numbing cold and more.

His devotion to yes has brought both of us great joy. One time, in Colorado (a winter adventure assignment), I drove and he rode shotgun through a blizzard. I could not see the road. A couple times I hit the rumble strips, and I wasn’t sure what side of the road I was on. The snow was coming straight at the windshield. My heart rate soared. 

“It looks like we’re in the Millennium Falcon going into light speed,” he said, and I snort-laughed, and all the tension drained from my body.

It’s funny; early on in our friendship, I thought of him and his wife as the friends who, if you called and said, “hey, do you want to go get a pizza?” you’d be at the pizza place with them 30 minutes later. Now I think of him as the guy who I call and say, “hey do you want to go to England with me?” and a few weeks later, we’re walking to Buckingham Palace together.

He says yes to pie for breakfast, to stopping for coffee, to taking the long way, to starting with a loose plan and abandoning even that.

His yesses make my life better, so I copy that attitude as often as I can.

Which brings me to taking 12 girls to see the Taylor Swift movie.

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Let’s be honest: Did I want to see the Taylor Swift movie? No. No I did not, not all 13 hours of it, at least. But Andy would have said yes, so I said yes when my daughters asked me to take them. Of course I stayed true to my yes when the invite list grew to the point we needed three vehicles. I said yes when they asked if I was actually going to go to the movie with all of them instead of just dropping them off.

Goodness, what I would have missed if I said no!

I would have missed the girls young women jumping out of their seats and fist-bumping for a rip-roaring romp through Fearless, You Belong With Me and Love Story (which contains the line, “just say yes,” which has been replaying in my brain like an ear worm the whole time I’ve been writing this.)

I would have missed dancing with them to Shake It Off.

Yer damn right I danced at a movie theater watching Taylor Swift. Not well. And not for long. And not with any semblance of rhythm or pace. But if my daughter says, “Dad, come dance with us!” I ain’t saying no, I don’t care how ridiculous I look, which in this case was very.

I would have missed fist-bumping the other dads in the theater, I would have missed eating my weight in popcorn, I would have missed fighting back tears at how much fun they were having.

My girls are 17 and 13. Their need for me is dwindling. Their desire to hang out with me is fading.

So I’m going to say yes.