Bernadette’s Rainbow Adventures, Part 7

Graduation and saying good-bye to Kilimanjaro

Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 , Part 4 , Part 5 , Part 6 , Part 7

I tore open the envelope, trying not to think about the hundreds of pink envelopes I had gotten over the years. Apparently, at some point in his youth, Daddy was told that pink means girl and blue means boy and he assumed that to be a universal truth which he never, ever questioned as long as he lived. To him, pink and blue was like left and right. There was no middle ground. You were one or the other. Instead of a spectrum of color, my Daddy saw a polarity of color. He may as well have been color blind.

In the envelope was a pink card. On the cover of the card was the drawing of a hippopotamus wearing a skirt while riding a unicycle while juggling bowling pins.

WTF?

There was no text to complement the art. There was nothing explanatory and opening the card, I saw that there was no printed text on the inside of the card as well. There was only Daddy’s chicken scrawl:

To my special Bernie,

I can’t believe your [sic] about to graduate from college!!! I sure wish I had. Your Mommy and I are so proud of you. As you know, Mommy can’t fly so it will only be I who comes to your graduation. I have…