My son thinks my father-in-law is D.B. Cooper.

Yes. The notorious plane hijacker.

I would hesitate to say this in print but for two things. 

One, my father-in-law is not, in fact, D.B. Cooper.  

Two, I’ve broadcasted Willie’s tax evasion for, like, a year. Yet the IRS only just sent a letter to the Temple of Doom. 

Addressed to Indy. 

Demanding he file his 2020 tax return. 

Hey, IRS. News flash. Indy didn’t file a tax return in 2019, either.  

Or 2021. Or 2022.  

And he’s been at Marion’s bar in Nepal for almost two years. So don’t hold your breath on Indy — Indy! — filing those tax returns. 

Now, I’m not worried some government agent will show up on my in-laws’ doorstep.  

Still, in the wee hours of night, I’ll fear my in-laws’ lives are about to be ruined by a federal investigation. 

I mean, I do need something to talk about after the taxes are filed.  

So, here goes. 

My son saw a sketch of D.B. Cooper and thought he resembled my father-in-law. 

D.B. Cooper was 40ish, six feet tall, with brown eyes and an everyman look about him. Sketches show a broad forehead and a narrow, clean-shaven chin, with dark hair in a Don Draper trim. 

My father-in-law is, indeed, six feet tall. 

But when this crime was committed in 1971, my father-in-law was in his 20s. Pictures from that time show a head of Art Garfunkel curls and rich beard. His blue eyes peer from wire glasses. 

And he looks exactly like Eric Clapton.  

Or Steven Spielberg circa Jaws. 

My son is not great with doppelgängers. He thinks my husband — a dead ringer for the lead actor in Amazon Prime’s The Expanse, pictured here — looks like Barack Obama. 

And he thinks I look like Emma Stone’s Gwen Stacy from the Andrew Garfield Spider-Man movies. 

When we point out the discrepancies in D.B. Cooper’s appearance, my son emphasizes how D.B. Cooper ordered a bourbon. 

My father-in-law is, in fact, a bourbon drinker. 

But according to the FBI, Cooper ordered a bourbon and soda.  

My father-in-law is no more likely to dilute his bourbon than he is to know the lead actor on The Expanse. 

Yes, Dad. I heard you say “The what?” when you read that line. 

I don’t know if you’d like it. It’s in space. I’ll think about it and get back to you. 

Building his case, my son asked my mother-in-law where my father-in-law was on Nov. 24, 1971. 

I wasn’t even born, and I can tell you where he was.  

It was the day before Thanksgiving.  

So he was at work.  

How do I know?  

Well, I live with his genetic clones. The three of them are mercenary — if there’s an opportunity to make some bank, you’ll find them at work. 

And my father-in-law would have worked because for as long as I’ve known him, he’s done two things at Thanksgiving: 

Carve the turkey and bug out. 

By dawn on Black Friday, my husband and father-in-law are headed to their cabin.  

They would sooner drink bourbon with soda than they would hit Black Friday sales. Black Friday shopping is their version of hell. 

Black Friday shopping with a bourbon ruined by soda? Is there a tenth circle of hell? Did Dante write a sequel? Inferno: Two Hot, Two Much Nonsense in Your Bourbon? 

Anyway, knowing he was off from work for two days, my father-in-law would have worked to the last possible minute. 

But my mother-in-law — known to encourage our trio of genetic clones with as much impunity as I’m known for — said she thought my father-in-law was probably at the cabin when the hijacking occurred. 

Which my son seized upon. Why would his grandfather go to the cabin the day before Thanksgiving rather than the day after, if not to hijack a plane? 

I mean, obviously. 

“Dude,” I said. “It wasn’t him! I’m telling you. It wasn’t him.” 

Now, theories about D.B. Cooper are as numerous as the bubbles in a bourbon and soda. Season one of Loki suggests the mischievous god was Cooper. Stephen White’s Manner of Death finds the protagonist meeting the man himself, living a quiet life with his stolen funds. 

And the podcast Death in the West spends a whole season on Richard Floyd McCoy, a hijacker with eerie similarities to Cooper. 

But, well, conjecturing loved ones’ secret lives is a family norm. 

My husband and I once spent an evening in El Paso — long story — theorizing Indy was, Big Fish-style, the president of Paraguay. 

We also think my husband’s uncle is a government assassin. 

Willie and I think Indy was a major player in the events of Argo.  

I mean, Indy was an embassy guard. And when we asked him to see Argo with us, he declined.  

I whispered to Willie, “It’s because he was there!” And Indy just smirked and walked away. 

Smirked. And walked away. 

So yeah. We think Indy was an Argo player. 

Now that I’m writing this, I think I have theories. Everyone else just goes along with me. 

Anyway. D.B. Cooper. 

I was reading the paper one day. A man — a criminal — had been leading a quiet, family life, evading capture for decades. 

Upon his arrest, his family connected dots never before realized. He refused to travel outside of the United States, for example. 

“Huh,” I thought. “Dad only ever goes to Canada.” 

Huh. 

Hmm. 

Don’t worry, Dad. Your secret is safe with me.