Hegemony

My father does not understand about asking questions. He does not understand the idea of requesting; my father only demands. Pass me the water pitcher, he says, someone get me a pen, not that one. Everyone is a disappointment to their parents, it is nothing personal. Perhaps it is the price we pay for conscience, imagination, the gamble of free will. If an animal can act only on instinct, on the overriding forces of biological imperative, then the animal by surviving is by definition successful, and it’s parents have thus also succeeded in having survived long enough to reproduce. Not so with humans, as Kipling had cause to muse. And yet…..Is there any harsher answer to a parent than suicide?