It's really long and very very angry.
Anybody who reads through it gets my respect and my love ;;

This is a lifetime of anger that finally has to come out.







My relationship with my dad has never been good.
My relationship with my dad didn't start good.


The only way he remembers my birth was because he was watching the football game in the waiting room of the hospital and the doctors came out to tell them that their daughter was born during halftime.

When I meet his friends, he tells them I was a "Halftime Baby."




This might sound like a term of endearment to some, but my mom told me that about an hour into her contractions, my dad just left to watch the game.
He wasn't grossed out. He was just bored.







We lived on the air-force base in North Dakota and my dad worked as a radio technician.
He was constantly at work, so whenever he would come home and mom would hand me over to him, I would scream bloody murder because to me he was a stranger.

How do you think he felt about his only child hating him from the start?



Well, anyways.. when I was about to go into preschool, we moved to Bellingham. The change was from a cheerful yellow two story house where I had my own secret hideout in my room to an impossibly small apartment with cigarette smoke stains.
Nobody was happy with the move.

And so my mom started work as a substitute teacher and my dad would pick me up from daycare everyday, and that meant he would take care of me everyday.


That, of course, was not fun.



Everyday I would get the same lunch of a plain peanut-butter sandwich, bitter and dry baby carrots, and plain yogurt.
What's worse is he would make me play guessing games to get this lunch.

The same guessing game for the same lunch every single day.


"Okay, I'm thinking of a number between 1 and 10!"


I was in preschool.
I was constantly being picked up by the other kids.
I didn't like being picked up, but they were bigger than me, so I didn't stand much of a chance telling them to stop.


I had developed a very strong dislike of guessing games and I learned very quickly from the other kids that giving up was the easiest way out of any situation.


So everyday I would tell my dad that I didn't want to play, I just wanted to have my lunch.
He was disappointed and angry with me everyday.







That's been hanging over me for a long time.

Now comes the recent events.






My dad is, quite plain and simple, a workaholic.


When we go on vacation, IF we go on vacation, he goes completely stir crazy because there's no computer there. My mom and I have a little tradition to go to Ocean Shores for a few days in the summer, and we always try to set it up for my dad to be unable to join us because he always manages to ruin the entire vacation.

At one of the hotels my mom and I commonly stay at, there's a computer on the second floor.
ONE. COMPUTER.

You can imagine how slow it is.



Mom and I will come back from walking on the beach for four or five hours and what are we greeted with?


"I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS HOTEL; THEIR ONE COMPUTER IS SO SLOW I HAD TO WAIT THIRTY MINUTES JUST FOR THE INTERNET TO COME UP SO I COULD SEE IF I HAD ANY EMAIL" on and on and on.



My dad has a bad back from spending over half his life on the computer, so we can't go camping because it hurts his back.
He can't make snowmen with his daughter because it hurts his back.

He can't run to the street to stop his one daughter, his only child, from nearly getting hit by a car because it hurts his back.

He couldn't sit on the floor and play Barbies with his one daughter, his only child, because getting up would hurt his knees and his back.



Something is always hurting him.

That means he's always in a bad mood.







This morning was just like many other mornings I've had to deal with.

He recently got his precious computer back and he's been reinstalling everything on it.

My dad may be a workaholic, but he has one hobby.


ONE.

HOBBY.





Fantasy basketball. Oh, yes.
It's a very watered down version of Dungeons and Dragons for those whose lives are so completely boring they can't have a hobby that requires any imagination.

Sorry if any of you like fantasy basketball ;;



Well, it turns out his fantasy basketball files weren't backed up properly, and so he lost all of them.


I haven't been feeling well for practically months. Both of my parents know this.
I'm woken up by my dad PUTTING HIS FOOT ON MY BED.


"I LOST MY FANTASY FOOTBALL DATA!"




I'm woken up from seven hours of crappy sleep.

I sit up, barely awake.

That's too bad, dad.



"YEAH, AND DO YOU KNOW WHERE MY WHITE TANK TOP IS?"

Oh, you mean one of the TWO tank tops that you have and therefore has to be washed constantly?
Of course I know where it is.


No, I don't, dad. Did you have me wash it with the whites or the colored clothes?

"I DON'T KNOW!"
He removes his foot from my bed and storms off.

He walks loudly when he's angry.
Something falls off my bookshelf.


It happens a lot.



He demands we look for his one white tank top that needs constant washing because it's the only white one and it's his favorite and it's the only one that fits him.


I'm still not awake and I still haven't recovered from being sick for a few months and I start looking for his stupid tank top.


My dad denies being sexist, but he considers himself the "bacon bringer" because he has two jobs (not because we need him to have two jobs; it was his choice) while my mom has one, so therefore my mom and myself are banished to do all the household chores.



Laundry is my job.



Laundry day is Friday and Saturday. It used to be Sunday, but dad usually wears a few pairs on underwear in a single day (no joke) and so it needs to be done more often than just one day a week.


I did the whites on Friday.


Now it's Sunday.



"I FOUND MY FUCKING TANK TOP. IT WAS IN WITH THE WHITES YOU NEED TO DO."

Dad, I did the whites TWO DAYS AGO..

"YEAH WELL IF YOU SEE THAT THERE'S A PILE OF CLOTHES, YOU NEED TO DO THEM!"



There's three pairs of his underwear and maybe five pairs of socks.
He made that in two days.



I'm doing my best to not stand up for myself.
If I stand up for myself, he yells at me.

I'm a failure.
I'll never get a job.
I'm lazy.

No more computer.
No more television.
No visiting with friends.


So it's best to stay quiet and save the anger for when he's on his death bed.
Then I can stand up for myself.


Anyways..
I've been awake for about ten minutes when


"YOU HAD THE WASHER SET TO COLD WATER. IT NEEDS TO AT LEAST BE ON WARM."

I've been awake for about TEN MINUTES.





He stomps off to change in his room and my mom gives me a hug.
She's frustrated with him too because she's had to deal with his crap for 20 odd years and today she's going grocery shopping with him.

She's been ready to go for a while and he's clunking around the house complaining.





Now she's telling me something funny she read in the paper and dad interrupts with
"I HURT MY KNEE GETTING UP."


Poor baby!


My mom gives me a look like holy shit, I married a three year old and says "did you get up at an awkward angle, Rex?"
"I DON'T KNOW. IT HASN'T HURT LIKE THIS BEFORE."
and he stomps off.

That's probably not a good thing to do with a hurt knee.





So I'm heating up my coffee and with talking mom and yet again he interrupts with
"IT HURTS WHEN I STEP!"



We both have to pretend to care.





Finally, they're both in the car about to leave when I hear dad making his angry noises.
He comes into the house with a bag of dirty clothes. What the hell?
Why were there clothes in the car?


Do I want to know? No.
Never ask questions.



He makes it out to be my fault. He's angry at me when it's his dirty clothes.

I have to listen to him and make believe it's my fault.
He puts them in with the whites which are in the washer and I hear him making more angry noises because you obviously can't just shove more clothes in the washer when it's running.
His pants get soap on them and he has to change them.

More laundry.





I get mornings like this all the time.

The light-bulb in his room burned out.
He can't find the bread. It's on the microwave where it always is.
The backyard needs to be cleaned.
The dishes have to be done.
He can't find his favorite cup.

I'm a disappointment for not getting any national scholarships, for not having a job, for being .2 away from a 4.0 gpa in senior year of highschool, for not remembering to put his special mixer cups on his spot at the table, for not remembering to hang up his undershirts.



Every time I try to do something great, to achieve my goals, what do I get?

You can't do that. Costs too much money. People with your work ethic can't do that.






Dad?






Don't you ever fucking tell me what I can't do.




Some day, I'm going to have to tell you everything.

I'm going to tell you how often you made mom cry, made her regret the marriage.
I'm going to tell you how inconsiderate you are.
I'm going to tell you how much of a sexist, racist pig you are.
I'm going to tell you that I know about the other women you saw.
I'm going to tell you how often you made me want to kill myself as a child.
I'm going to tell you that every lie, every complaint, every noun and syllable you yelled at me only made me hate you more and more.




Dad?


I hate you.
I've always hated you.
I will never stop hating you.







-big sigh of relief-
And that's it!

Did you read all the way through?
You have no idea how much that means to me.

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