The elephant in the room

My father, the Trump voter

A couple of weeks ago I had dinner with my dad for the first time in a while. We went to Cancun on Lewis (where they now accept credit cards, by the way). It was a slow night—a couple of men, presumably immigrants, at a nearby table and the woman who runs the place were the only other people there. 

My dad ordered a Corona, opted out of the lime. He reminded me that he used to come here often before he retired. 

“Oh, this is great,” I said when the guacamole arrived at our table. “You’ve got to try it.” 

“I hate avocados,” he said. 

“Really?” I wondered how I didn’t know this already. 

The men sitting at the table behind us were speaking in Spanish. My dad, who learned Spanish at some point during his long career in law enforcement, said they were discussing the best and worst things about Mexico versus the United States. He said this a little loud for my comfort. I don’t mind eavesdropping, but I felt uneasy letting on about it. 

We gave our orders to the waitress. As he handed over his menu I noticed the spasm in his arm had gotten worse since I saw him last. It was almost rhythmic now, the way his arm dipped down his side and swung back up. The repetition was almost comical, like in an old vaudeville dance routine or something. 

“This is the best salsa in town.” He certainly is a man of opinions. 

Like a lot of you, when I was growing up my dad was basically a superhero; he was actually a Secret Service agent. He spent most of his adult life contractually obligated to take a bullet for the president, among other duties like investigating fraud and counterfeit currency. 

I can’t imagine sacrificing my life for someone I didn’t even vote for. I guess I’m not that selfless. 

I asked him if he had been keeping up with the debates. He said he hadn’t. I didn’t have to prompt him any further before he confirmed what I already suspected: He’ll be voting to make America great again. I cringed as my father, the only white man in a room of immigrants and women, confidently proclaimed that he will be voting for Trump.

This is usually where I, as the token liberal of my immediate family, would chime in with some progressive argument. This was right after Trump’s “grab them by the pussy” tape leaked. I wanted so badly to ask him to reconsider his vote. At the very least as a father. But this time I bit my tongue. 

This time was different. 

Ever since his first of several strokes, he’s had trouble making sense of things, and so have I. He’s lost about 80 pounds in the last year. His hair is entirely white now. A degenerative neurological disease makes it increasingly more difficult for him to control his limbs. 

This is very likely the last election he will vote in (barring some 1960 Chicago-style voter fraud). Who am I to tell this man, my father, who to vote for this time around? Part of me pities him, in a way. He doesn’t know—or care—about Trump’s policies, nor has he kept up with any of his scandals and general buffoonery. 

He reminded me that he’s voted for the Republican candidate in every presidential election since 1972. He can’t vote for Hillary because she’ll destroy this country, even worse than Obama already has, in his mind. 

I think he just wants to vote Republican one last time. I already feel guilty about not seeing him enough; I won’t try to take that away from him. 

As long as I can remember, my dad has voted for the Republican presidential candidate as “the lesser of two evils,” which is a phrase I hate. He won’t vote third party because he sees it as a wasted vote (though it seems to me that a vote for a candidate you don’t believe in is the only way to truly waste a vote). I assumed working alongside Presidents Ford, Carter, Reagan, H. W. Bush, Clinton, and W. Bush, plus their respective vice presidents, would give him an intuitive sense of what makes a good one. Maybe it does? What do I know, anyway? 

Rather than try to change his mind, I chewed on the inside of my cheek. I finished the guacamole. I don’t want to think about him dying. 

The men at the other table talked about different names for types of family members in English and Spanish—something that always confused me when I was studying Spanish in college. I eavesdropped: “El padre de mi esposa es mi suegro, es ‘father-in-law’…” 

It’s unnerving: the superhero from my childhood voting for this cartoonishly villainous candidate, who could affect my life for the next four years, which is at once far too long and not nearly long enough. 

I don’t want my dad to vote for Trump, but in that moment it seemed less important. I just wanted to enjoy our meal together, because I don’t know how many of those we’ll have left.

For more from M.W., read her article on spiritual exploration in Tulsa.