It wouldn’t be Father’s Day without a healthy dose of chaos. Loose plans to enjoy the outdoors offered chaos just the right amount of material.

My family already doesn’t have a great track record with outdoor activities. One catastrophe from camping-trips-past had culminated in a fire department appearance and an unrelated trip to the emergency room. That’s where my brother earned his nickname, “Bloody-Straw.”

Given that history, we had no business being at the Smith Lake trailhead in 80-plus degree weather around 2 p.m.

But it was Father’s Day, and that’s what my dad wanted to do.

My dad, sister, mother and I were ready to begin, but my brother (aka Bloody-Straw) and his family were nowhere to be found. He had decided to take a separate car and leave from his place.

Although my brother had the pin to the location, with no service and no notification from them on when they had left, there was no way of knowing how soon they’d be there.

After standing around in the heat, we made the hard call to take off without them.

It was a good thing, too, because my sister finally received just enough spotty cell service during the hike to discover that they were still an hour away.

I don’t know if it’s the trauma of that past camping trip, or my own anxious energy, but as we hiked up, I thought through scenarios on how things could go wrong, from my brother and his family taking the wrong trail, taking a wrong turn, to us never meeting up at all.

But eventually, after snacking around the lake we had hiked to, we all heard my brother’s distinct baritone voice resound across the lake.

Between yelling sibling insults to get his attention and my dad hiking back around the lake to fetch them, we were finally all together.

It’s endearing how quickly my tension subsided once we reunited. I realized I had been trying to fight the chaos in my mind, but it was a waste of energy because it all worked out in the end.

I decided that next time, I was going to surrender to the chaos. Fighting it had really done nothing for me, except stress me out.

Little did I know how soon that next time would arrive.

While lounging around the lake and losing track of time, someone had the foresight to ask what time the Frosty, which my dad wanted to stop at on the way home, closed.

Upon the revelation that it closed in just over an hour, my family went from looking like sunbathing lizards to a disturbed colony of ants.

We had a 1.5-mile hike out, then another 20-minute drive to crunchy french fries and milkshakes that taste even better after a hike. Getting there on time was going to be close, but this time, I wasn’t going to worry. I was going to go with the flow.

Thanks to the mostly downhill hike back and my mom’s lead foot, we arrived at the Frosty five minutes before closing. At least my mom, sister, sister-in-law, niece, and I did.

We had to leave the boys since they were a half mile behind.

I panic-ordered a smattering of burgers, fries and shakes, suddenly forgetting how to do math, and apologized profusely when I saw the server’s eyes go wide at the order.

As the food came out, the boys rolled up (we had made sure they had the key to the other car before we abandoned them). We had faith they would figure out our plan to go ahead to the Frosty.

Again, everything worked out. Despite my jumbled order, we had the perfect amount of food. We were all reunited again.

And the Frosty employees got a really, really big tip.

Surrendering and, dare I say, embracing the chaos wasn’t so bad after all.

It sparked the exciting, humor-inducing moments that vibrantly color the memories of that day.

I hope everyone had a great Father’s Day with the perfect amount of chaos.