The Patriarch

The patriarch sits in his comfortable chair, eyes half closed, kinda dozing off. The women are in the kitchen squabbling about the pot roast — too much salt, not enough pepper. They do this every year.

Some game or another flickers on the TV. The purpose of the game to the patriarch is clear – it provides the white noise that covers up (a) the women bickering, (b) the older boy’s Rooster Tooth podcast, and (c) the incessant sound of guns and death coming from the younger boy’s xbox.

For these purposes, bowling is the gold standard. The ball rolls down the alley — microphones poised to catch the rumble of hard rubber against polished wood. A few seconds later, the soft sound of the pins mixing it up, like distant thunder. Soft, deep male voices between shots bridge the sound gaps — a perfect backdrop for a perfect nap.

Even better, televised bowling seems to repel everyone except the old dog. The old dog seems to get it, a frustrated patriarch in his own right, his ability to reproduce ended before it even begun. But the old dog is another old man, and lays comfortably in front of the sound of the pins falling.

The patriarch sighs and settles further into his chair — he isn’t sure, but he thinks he hears himself snoring. The thought startles him a bit and he awakens, only to find the dog at his feet, snoring and passing gas. The patriarch lets one go too — the women won’t know if it was the dog or him. He smiles and settles back into his twilight zone. It is the third frame.

Truth be told, the women wouldn’t know if it was him or the dog because they won’t get within ten feet of his bowling sanctuary. He’s lucky with these women, they respect his space and territory. He respects theirs, too, which is one of the reasons that he invested in a beer fridge a few years back. He doesn’t need to interrupt them, nor them him, and all seem happier because of it.

The patriarch awakes to a sensation — he has to take a piss. four and a half frames have gone by, Johnson is leading Walker by 12 pins going into the all-important eighth frame. He slowly forces himself out of his chair, the old dog laying flat on his side opens one eye for a moment, then closes it. Back in the old days, he would have popped out of the chair and the dog would have bounded after him, but those days are gone.

He goes to the bathroom, unzips, and lets the pee flow out of him like a yellowish river. He’s fortunate that it isn’t his prostate causing this — yet — it was the beer. Satisfied that his innards are still working properly, he goes over to wash his hands. He looks down, turns on the faucet and presses on the liquid soap dispenser, washing his hands for a few seconds. He rinses his hands, fills them with cold water, and splashes the water onto his face.

He looks up into the mirror to comb his hair and I see myself — the face that I’ve seen in that mirror for nearly sixty years — but no longer the kid that I once was. Now I see the patriarch. Me.