“You forgot to carry the one”

I got up early this morning to do homework. Fifth grade homework can be pretty demanding, especially if you have missed some school due to illness.

My dad had to get up with me, because there was no freakin' way that I was going to do an hour of math before school without the proverbial gun at my head. So Dad held the gun, and I did my math. I also made sure that my dad's level of frustration met or exceeded my own, for that is my M.O. My dad calls it "pushback," but I call it justice. Why does my dad feel that it's his holy obligation to hold my feet to the fire on every stinking aspect of my life? Wouldn't I benefit as much or more by making some mistakes and suffering the consequences on my own? He would save us both so much grief.

I'm going out into the world every day, getting my head bashed in (not literally) by teachers and students, all with their own indecipherable agendas, and when I come home at the end of the day, there's my retired father, jumping my case from the get-go. "Wipe your feet!" "Practice the piano!" "Clean your room!"

Honestly, it never ends.

He has aspirations, my dad. He wants to be a writer and a successful businessman. He wants the admiration of adults and children alike. He's constantly on the go (except for when he's setting a new record on the pinball machine), and he's diverting way too much of his energy trying to make me something I'm not, or at least don't have the desire to be.

Jung stated, "The greatest burden a child must bear is the unlived life of the parents." Well, let me tell ya', I sure wish that my dad had done his homework when he was a kid, so that I wouldn't have to be going through this domestic hell on a daily basis. And if he'd practiced the piano more when he was my age, maybe I'd have a social life.

Granddad is okay, but when my dad was a kid, Granddad was a military officer, and I get the impression that Dad got his ass beat every once in a while. There's no hitting in our house (let's leave my sister out of this), but I think that I'd rather have my butt warmed a little than go through some of these after-school nightmares.