Paternal love
Saturday morning. My father calls.
Dad (cheerily): Hello love! I just wanted to tell you that I’ve worked out that you’re exactly a third of a century old today. Thirty-three-and-a-third-years-old. That’s thirty-three years and a hundred and twenty two days.
Me (blearily): Uhhh…
Dad: And I thought that was interesting because –
Me: Dad, please don’t start talking about Jesus again.
[There is a short pause whilst we both remember a somewhat strained episode when he rang on my birthday to inform me that I was now the same age as Christ when he died. Which led to a comparison of life achievements, during which I asked him what he expected when you considered mine and Baby J’ s differing parental role models and pointed out that at least I hadn’t started a religion responsible for the deaths of millions]
Dad: Well, if you believe he was born on Christmas Day and died in April (which I know is debatable, but say you do), Jesus was exactly thirty-three and a third years old when he was crucified. And so you’re exactly the same age today as he was ON THE DAY HE DIED!
Me (wearily): And?
Dad: And so you should feel quite jolly. Compared to him you’re doing rather well. I thought you might like to hear that.
I decide that he does not need to know that his precious first-born is drinking wine at 11 am and lighting fags off the toaster as part of her own private crucifixion of the self.
Thanks Dad, I say. You’ve cheered me up no end.
Dad (cheerily): Hello love! I just wanted to tell you that I’ve worked out that you’re exactly a third of a century old today. Thirty-three-and-a-third-years-old. That’s thirty-three years and a hundred and twenty two days.
Me (blearily): Uhhh…
Dad: And I thought that was interesting because –
Me: Dad, please don’t start talking about Jesus again.
[There is a short pause whilst we both remember a somewhat strained episode when he rang on my birthday to inform me that I was now the same age as Christ when he died. Which led to a comparison of life achievements, during which I asked him what he expected when you considered mine and Baby J’ s differing parental role models and pointed out that at least I hadn’t started a religion responsible for the deaths of millions]
Dad: Well, if you believe he was born on Christmas Day and died in April (which I know is debatable, but say you do), Jesus was exactly thirty-three and a third years old when he was crucified. And so you’re exactly the same age today as he was ON THE DAY HE DIED!
Me (wearily): And?
Dad: And so you should feel quite jolly. Compared to him you’re doing rather well. I thought you might like to hear that.
I decide that he does not need to know that his precious first-born is drinking wine at 11 am and lighting fags off the toaster as part of her own private crucifixion of the self.
Thanks Dad, I say. You’ve cheered me up no end.
posted by Lady V at 10:36 pm
8 Comments:
ah yes, the old toaster classic.
pyjama bottoms?
greasy mop of hair?
richard and judy in the background?
bin overflowing with tea bags (which remind you that you are/or soon may be on the rag)
well. chapeau to your dad for trying. my mother gave me a rather GYYYYYYYYYYNORMOUS crucifix/slash rosary that i've embraced much to the horror of well, anyone who has seen it.
if you want
you can touch it.
right. bed. you'll have passed out already i imagine.
Blimey. Apart from the religious fixation, your Dad sounds identical to mine - that self-obsessed certainty together with a total lack of empathy or understanding. Except, of course, that mine's dead. Or at least, I think he is: I didn't actually see the body. Maybe he led a double life and you and I are, in fact, related...
I have so got to lay off the coffee.
is it possible we all have the same father (errr scratch that, on second thought, i'm really hoping not.)
V, did your father also give you a card on your 19th birthday listing famous overachievers and what they had already contributed to society by that age?
while you contemplating whether to slit your wrists before or after your (erstwhile) favorite uncle had a chance to add to his litany of `we had such high hopes for you when you were young'?
and to think it's all downhill from here.
blimey. suddenly loving old michael jackson the original.
permanently sauced.
with odd bout of domestic violence
remind me I'll get a table lighter for your flat!
Are all we still planning to have kids to inflict such pain on them afterwards?
Parents.. blimey! what a category of individuals!
hmm, kids, i appear to have unleashed fodder for ranting. I'm sure we're all related really, when it comes to it and in fact these blogs are just the 2006 equivalent of a family Sunday lunch. with fewer rows, natch....
Sadly, was not in pyjamas or even my own flat whilst indulging in said booze and fags Naked and staggering in someone else's borrowed penthouse flat.
Ah well. Love you all.
need I mention my mum?
We want a comedy book! We want a comedy book!
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