Thursday, March 02, 2006

Wow, I'm losing respect for you.

Dad drinks every night. And when he stays up late enough to get, uh, drunk? or something, when he stays up late, he gets into a mood where he wants to talk. And inevitably, he starts talking about God and the Bible, and how he is such a good person. This always upsets me and I avoid being downstairs at these times. Not so tonight.

So, he starts talking, "In the bible it says. . . " and he holds out his left hand, cradling this imaginary bible while his right hand flips through imaginary pages, "that life is in the blood." And he stares at me, like he always does, because it takes SO long for the next sentence to come out and I don't know whether this is a moment where I'm supposed to respond, or if I'm supposed to stare back until he finishes the thought. Of course, no response is required. Never, really. I could sit silently staring at him while he talked for hours, because he doesn't really care what I think, what I have to say. And I think to myself, How does he know what the Bible says? I've never seen him read anything but the T.V guide. So, is this something the T.V. preacher said on the Jesus channel? Is this coming from some special he watched on PBS? Or perhaps from something Grandpa said? He doesn't even own a Bible. But, here he is telling me what it says and what it means. And I wonder, if I said these things to him, would he even remember in the morning?

Sarah Jo

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