Father as the Child in the Family

I don't know who is the adult in my family -- me, or my father. I find myself telling him to turn down the volume of the television because the walls of my room are shaking. I find myself telling him to clean up after himself when he eats. I find myself telling him to put his things away so as not to mess up the house, but he continues to leave everything a mess.

I don't want this blog to be another father-bashing blog entry, but this is how I am feeling. Because of nights like tonight I ask myself whether I would prefer to live the unrestricted immature selfish and meaningless life my father lives, or the meaningful, yet depravitive live that a chassidic person devoid of fun and secular activities seemingly lives. I know these aren't the only choices and my facts aren't entirely correct, but I have a tendency to see truth as black and white rather than shades of grey.

Truth IS black and white, not greys. However, living fully in black and white is simply not practable and I simply will not survive in that world. My secular temptations and drives are far to strong to even contemplate that holy and purity of an existence. I am anything but a puritan. Plus, G-d DID create greys, did he not?

I took a bath tonight, and while I was sitting in the tub, I contemplated what kind of woman I'd want to marry. I've decided again on a modern-chassidic one. This is nothing new, but I am at the point where I want to stop kidding myself as to wanting a fully chassidish, religious girl. In my heart, I do want this, but the girls I have been introduced to so far have lacked the attributes that would make her compatible with me, namely they lack a spark of life, and the truly religious ones don't and can't relate to the temptings of even a kosher secular life. I am beginning to think that this kind of girl I am looking for -- a girl with a spark -- does not exist in the religious world, and that I don't belong fully frum in appearance either.

Anyway, my mood has changed in the last two days. I have gone from depression to anger. It is not a good thing to feel baseless anger, of course, but any change away from depression is a positive one. I called my father a "child" to his face this evening when he, walking around in his tidy whities, complained that 70 degrees in the house was too cold when it is around 30 degrees outside. He wanted to raise the heat, and when I told him instead to put something on and when he refused, I called him a child. This is after me telling him not to blast the television twice in a row. I'd also tell him that sitting twelve inches in front of the television is unhealthy, but I am not his father. I wish I had a father figure and not a fifty-seven year old child running practically naked around the house.