Or: I Remember It Differently (And Apparently Incorrectly)
There is a very particular thrill that comes from being right.
Not morally superior. Not spiritually enlightened.
Just right.
The date was Thursday.
The meeting was at 3pm.
The restaurant was 1998, not 1999.
You know it.
You feel it.
You can almost taste the victory.
And then someone says…
“Actually…”
That word should come with a warning label.
Let me clarify something straight away.
In our house, I am not the chief corrector.
That role belongs to Stella.
I will confidently announce, “That was definitely a Thursday.”
Without hesitation she’ll say, “It was Wednesday.”
Now, a normal, emotionally regulated adult might pause here.
I do not.
“No, it was Thursday. I remember. We watched football that night and you said…”
And then she calmly dismantles my memory with the precision of a forensic accountant.
“It was Wednesday. You watched football on Thursday. And we ate at eight, not seven, because you were late.”
Here’s the awkward truth.
She is almost always right.
Not occasionally right.
Not inconveniently right.
Relentlessly right.
And the worst bit?
I know she’s right while I’m arguing.
I know it as I’m constructing my increasingly fragile defence. I know it while rummaging through memory looking for supporting evidence that simply does not exist. I know it while defending Thursday as if it’s under constitutional threat.
But still, something in me bristles.
Over what?
A day.
A time.
A detail so minor that historians would refuse to record it.
Yet in the moment it feels bigger. Like my credibility has been lightly nudged.
Which is absurd. Because the credibility in question is imaginary.
And then there’s Kyle.
Kyle doesn’t argue.
Kyle verifies.
The moment I start a sentence that sounds vaguely factual, his phone appears. Not aggressively. Just quietly. Efficiently.
Tap. Scroll. Search.
He doesn’t interrupt. He waits.
And here’s the brutal detail.
He only comments when I’m wrong.
If I’m right?
Nothing.
The phone goes back into his pocket without ceremony. No applause. No “Nice one, Dad.” Just silence.
But if I’m wrong?
There’s a soft, polite “Actually…”
And Google sides with him.
So now I’m being corrected by my wife and fact-checked by my son in real time.
This is modern fatherhood.
I grew up believing dads were broadly correct by default. Slightly mythical. Rarely cross-examined by a handheld supercomputer.
Now I live with two people who carry more accurate information about the universe in their pockets than I carry in my entire memory.
And here’s the thing.
None of this actually matters.
The world does not tilt because I got Wednesday wrong.
Civilisation will not collapse because we ate at eight.
But occasionally, I react as if it might.
That’s the ego bit.
Being right feels powerful.
Being corrected feels small.
And instead of laughing and saying, “Fair enough,” I sometimes launch into a defence speech nobody requested.
If this happened in a meeting, I’d be impressively mature.
“Good catch.”
“Appreciate that.”
“Thanks for correcting me.”
At home? Occasionally I behave like a teenager who has just discovered he doesn’t, in fact, know everything.
Which, for clarity, I do not.
The trouble with being right isn’t that it’s wrong.
It’s that Google now has a vote in the family.
And apparently it votes against me more often than I’d like.
So I’m practising something new.
When Stella corrects me, I’m trying to say, “You’re probably right.”
When Kyle reaches for his phone, I’m trying not to pre-defend.
Progress is slow.
Thursday is still under occasional threat.
But I’m beginning to suspect that peace is more impressive than precision.
And if I’m wrong about that, I’m sure someone in this house will let me know.
