Summer is definitely here, heralded by its usual signs, which is me lying in bed sweating most of the night, and the cat stretched out as much as possible on the hardwood floor looking miserable. There's an old window unit lying around that my landlady said I could use, but it weighs a ton and I'm all out of burly men to install it for me. I'll have to see how the weather continues. Last year I was okay until mid-July, and I can't tell if this mugginess is just because we're still in the rainy season or if it's here to stay.

Despite the small trauma, I did have a good time in New York. My mother insisted that I take her car, and I didn't protest. My parents' house is at the bottom of an incredibly steep driveway, and I was almost to the top when I heard my father's trademark attention-getter, the whistle. He's jogging up the stairs that line the driveway. I was going to stop to get something out of my own car anyway, so I got out of the car and asked what he wanted.

He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out his money clip, peeled off a hundred-dollar bill, and said, "Have a great time."

(Please don't get the impression that my father carries around wads of hundred dollar bills. My parents were setting off on their own road trip, which I'm sure is why he had it.)

I did try to protest this, but he forced it into my hand, quickly kissed my cheek, and set off back down the driveway.

For those of you who have been reading me since last fall, you're aware of the issues I have with my father. If you haven't, you can't read about them anymore because I took those entries out of the archives. (Quiet, it's my journal.) Suffice it to say that I have issues, and I'm starting now to realize that he must sense that something is wrong.

My father has always been extremely generous with me, but it's usually like the above -- last-minute generosity. When I first tell them about things like trips to New York, their first reaction is not to throw money at me. In fact, their first reaction is generally, "How can you afford to do that?" And then sometimes, but not all the time, they'll come around at the last minute and agree to buy my plane ticket.

But this somehow felt wrong, a blatant attempt on his part to get me to love him as wide-eyed and wondrously as I used to. It was sneaky, the transaction on the driveway, another twenty seconds and I would have been out of sight. I don't even know if my mother knows he did it.

The hundred dollar bill is sitting in an envelope in my desk. I didn't have the heart to give it back to him, because rather than be proud of me for not spending it frivolously, I feel like he'd be hurt by the rejection. I know this because I'm like that too. Although I don't generally give people money, I do make concerted efforts to be generous, and I do take it personally when they aren't accepted.

I'll figure out something to do. My mother's birthday is the same week as Father's Day, so maybe I'll use it to get them something really nice. I'll find some way to give it back.