Dork

Terms of endear­ment come in many forms. They are a pri­vate lan­guage sys­tem between indi­vid­u­als express­ing love and appre­ci­a­tion. These words express an intent that may be the oppo­site of the com­monly held def­i­n­i­tion of the word itself. It all has to do with the con­text — who says it and why.

Melissa and Valessa were once mem­bers of a very small youth group in a church I once served. Some­times they would go on day trips with our senior cit­i­zens (with per­mis­sion from their teach­ers). It was an odd sort of arrange­ment — senior cit­i­zens plus two girls skip­ping school for the day. The redeem­ing fac­tor for them and the teach­ers that let them go was the fact that our trips were very edu­ca­tional (places like the world’s largest sun tele­scope at Sunspot, New Mexico).

Peo­ple express their appre­ci­a­tion in some funny ways. On one return trip, Melissa called me a “Dork” — as I drove the van full of older peo­ple back to El Paso. A cou­ple of the older church mem­bers were offended that she did that. I just laughed. I knew what she meant. I sensed the intent behind her voice. She is allowed to call me a Dork because of the tone in which she said it. It was by no means an insult. She was smil­ing with this lit­tle insight. The truth is: I am sort of a Dork.

A Dork is an odd per­son that is a lit­tle bit nerd, not always socially cool, but some­one you might like to have around any­way. A Dork is a car­toon Ziggy or Char­lie Brown. We have large heads but do not always use the brains that are in them. Heaven only knows what our redeem­ing qual­i­ties might be.

Melissa and Valessa and I have kept up with each other through the years. They call me “dad” as another term of endear­ment and irony (no, I am not their bio­logic par­ent). We are friends but more than friends; we con­sider our­selves fam­ily. Though we sel­dom see each other, we main­tain an odd close­ness far away. They have chil­dren of their own now. I once flew back to do the wed­ding for Melissa. “Fam­ily” is any­one you love…and even­tu­ally even those you don’t — as you mature in the faith.

Any­time I take myself too seri­ously, I hear Melissa’s voice in the back of my head: “Dork” — a con­jured term nor­mally an insult but used as endear­ment. The next time I have to sign a doc­u­ment for the church requir­ing a title, I think I will sign it as I sign this lit­tle blurb:

His Dork­ness, Dale Andrews