nightfight

It's 11 PM when my parents get into a fight because no one emptied the dishwasher today. I retreat to the basement, browse the must-glazed cardboard boxes full of dated schoolbooks, rifle through my brother's high school yearbook from 1988, idly run a hand over the punching bag I got for Christmas when I was fifteen and angry. It's quiet down here but for the hum of the water heater, busily warming the water rushing over the dirty dishes in the fateful dishwasher upstairs.

My feet get cold in the basement, and when I go back to the kitchen, Dad is getting himself a glass of water. We say nothing; I wonder if he is so angry about the dishes because he is stressed by other things in his life. I wonder if it's because he is still paying for his 23-year-old daughter's car insurance. I want him to tell me if he's tired and pissed. I know that's not what it's about, but I am thinking about so many things that it seems a real possibility.

I want anyone to tell me if they're pissed. There's no point bottling it up or bitching about it to someone else; it does no one any good. Tell me if you're upset. That's all you can do. Communicate.

I think about the various fights I've heard muffled through the walls over the years, and I think about the friends who've told me about their own parents' unspoken tensions, and I think about the unspoken tensions I've faced myself. I wonder about the ability to get so angry for such small reasons at people you know you love dearly.

All we can do is try to face each other and the truth and the love. The best we can do is just to try.