Daddy's miracle

My dad just got home from his last port, Japan. He only gets to go home every year and a half, and stays here for a good three months before he goes back to work as captain for cargo sea vessel. This being the case, we've always had issues dealing with one another cause he has a good 5-yr lag when it comes to my age and his expectations of how I should behave. When I was 18, my sister asked him how old I was, and with a straight face, he replied "thirteen". No flinching, not joking, straight up caught in a weird delayed otherworldly dimension where his little girl has managed to get stuck at pre-puberty.

i guess all dads are like that with their daughters. My situation however, has always been a tad exaggerated on account that he has never witnessed any of his daughters on the process of growing up. He has always been the biggest non-supporter of any item of clothing that exposes skin beyond the shoulders, his set legal-to-own-a-boyfriend age for me and my sisters is the age of 35, and he still buys us (including me) stickers and sticker pads. the shiny little girl collection type.

So imagine my surprise when this actually happened.

lunch table. me, mom, and dad.
dad: ... well, you took my phone, so i need a temporary one.
me: yeah, you can use the one i was using but not for so long, okay? i gotta give that back.
dad: you're just selfish. you want two phones all to yourself.
me: no, really dad! i gotta give that back! that's my boyfriend's!

(mom chokes on a lettuce and gives me a "you're-not-supposed-to-tell-him-i-allow-that-shit-and-so-now-you're dead" look while gagging.)

Silence. Nervous looks were exchanged. Then dad says one word like he didn't hear anything.

"Fine."

And he continues to eat. WOW. This is monumental. My jaw dropped and waited for some rage to set in but he changed the subject and said the salad was great. Amazing! No sarcasm, no anger, not even a nostril flared. For a brief moment I thought I saw my life pass before my eyes because of my little slip up. Fine?! I sincerely heard the hallelujah chorus. I have just crossed the line that has condemned me into wearing frilly pink dresses in his mind for eternity. I am old enough for a boyfriend. A legal, accepted, non-imaginary one.

After years of him thinking I'm still twelve, I just made a giant leap, and you cannot grasp how much this makes me giddy. Not to mention proud of him, for finally coming around and accepting the fact that his little girl is growing up. He had said once that he'll only allow us, his girls, to grow out of "little girls" status when we deserve it, and this event has just validated a form of recognition from him that I'm "ready".

My goodness. He thinks I'm "ready". Now I gotta prove that to myself.