Not a Friend of Mine

Would you hang with your parents if they weren’t your parents?  No really.  Think about that.  We all have friends that are our parents age, people that we respect, coworkers, that we have allowed into our inner circle of friend-dom.  But, if your mom or dad wasn’t mom or dad would they be in your inner circle?

Why You All in My Grill, Reid?

The years I thought Dad was the greatest man on earth.

Trust me, I’m not asking you anything that I haven’t asked myself.  Nothing I haven’t asked myself and come up with a resounding no regarding my Pops.  Mom would be in my top three all day everyday.  Two weeks ago, though, as I packed dishes into boxes and Dad sat at the table linking story to anecdote, I realized that I don’t like him.  *gasps*  There I said it.

All these years I thought it was the animosity that I carried from childhood.  That night I realized that we just don’t gel.  We would get along.  Dad would be the dude that I tolerate because he is a coworker, or a friend of one of my boys, or a boyfriend to one of my homegirls, or a husband to a church member.  Other than that the connection would die.

“Reid, I need some people to help me pack up my house and move it into storage,” he would ask.

My reply: “Um, how did you get my number?”

Yet at the same time I get slightly remorse because I feel that way about my dad.  I’m respecting him and trying to love him merely for that fact.  I don’t know if it’s because I’ve gone so long hating him and writing him off as “that dude.”  Or maybe now that I’m in the wonderful ripe thirties, I’m thinking like an adult and viewing him accordingly.  Maybe, just maybe, God has answered my prayers and all the angst has been relieved and…no that’s definitely not it.

Maybe we need more time. Pray for me.  I just don’t like him, right now.  Sue me.  You probably don’t like yours either.  Do you?