Reflection

I don’t have much to write about today. Actually, this is not true. There are many things that I want to say, but years of inhibition through social conditioning don’t provide me with the assurance or confidence that I should. Dad and his wife made their annual visit to Las Vegas this past weekend, and for as much as I intellectually didn’t want to I let it emotionally get the best of me. Core personality factors are not easily laid aside (at least not for me) and I find that particularly with family they are awakened from their slumber by little more than real time exposure. The love/hate relationship between fathers and sons appears to be a dynamic as old as the species, and so I have nothing unique to claim in that respect. However, as one who fervently wants to believe that we determine our own destiny by virtue of the decisions we make I continue to wrestle with how best to cope with the fundamental disparities that exist between Dad and me. I am haunted by the sentiment expressed by Mike and the Mechanics that it is important to work through these differences “in the living years” rather than waiting until it is too late, but pain avoidance holds powerful sway with me. I suspect that I will never be whole nor healthy until I discover how to be authentic in this most primal of relationships, and this fact alone serves as incentive to keep looking.