Family Dinner : 10.27.03 @ 6:45 pm

I don�t know how the conversation started. Like all supper time conversations I suppose, with politics and the media.
But the ending still burns in my mind.

It was something to do with health education in public schools. Mum was saying that is was the parent�s job to teach morals to their children, while the school covered the science behind it.
�I guess we failed there.� My father says before a bite of his food.
�What?� I ask. I don�t need to be told that he�s talking about me. I don�t need to be told, because my sister is Daddy�s darling and my brother doesn�t voice his own opinion.
He looks at me, that look in his eye... I can�t explain it. But it�s like he�s trying to hit me with his eyes, like he hates me and wishes he could reach over the casserole and smack everything he hates out of me.

�I think you guys did a pretty good job. I�ve grown into a well spoken, well educated, well rounded, intelligent, responsible and mature young person.� I can feel the confidence in my voice, and it surprises me. I do not compliment myself easily, nor take pride in my characteristics. An analysis of any given family dinner might tell a psychologist why.

�Your problem is that you don�t treat your elders with respect. You talk to your parents like you know all, like we�re your punk friends standing on a street corner.� His pupils are dilated and his neck seems elongated from his shoulders.

�So because I don�t kiss your ass, because I�m not Catholic, because I don�t agree with everything you say, are you saying I�m a failure?� Because I�m not straight hangs in the air, unspoken. That is an untouchable subject between us. A closet, open and overflowing, yet ignored in hopes it will clean itself.

�In more ways then one.� He takes another bite of his chicken leg.
I get up and leave the dinning room, putting my dishes in the kitchen. I haven�t even left the kitchen before I feel the tears bubbling over inside of me. I stifle them until I�m downstairs, in my dark room, leaning against my locked door.
I�m not a failure. It hurts though. It hurts so much, even after all the things he�s said to me along those lines.
I stare into the blackness, my contorted, red face hidden by the safety of the dark room.
You�re not my father.
No real father would ever, ever, say that to their child.
And I can not give your precious respect to anyone that does.

/A

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