The good news is that it is a long weekend coming up. It caught me by surprise, I hadn’t realised that such fortune would bestow the worker this week. The bad news, however, is that I may have to visit the folks, well i mentioned that I might head down on Sunday for the night. I know that there are those people out there who absolutely love their family life and my hats go off to those virtuous souls, however the other half; the destitute and spiritually bankrupt, souls not dissimilar to myself find the ordeal of family responsibility a rather tiresome and bothersome obligation. In truth, the whole family thing and especially the happy family thing is just too hard to bear when one needs to travel half way across the country to partake in fifth commandment bullshit.

It is annoying that for some reason the onus is on me to bring my ass down to see Mum and Dad when it was their choice to move to the arse end of New South Wales. Like a five hour drive just for proprieties sake seems excessive. For what? So I can keep someone else happy. Pure people pleasing, and because it isn’t exactly people in the sense of other people but family – it is somehow transformed into duty, responsibility or obligations because there are blood ties involved. It even seems antiquated in this age of self. What gain can be angled from this antiquity? None! It is purely an indulgence in superficial pleasantries. What’s a selfish old sod like me to do?

Family dynamics and relationships may seem interesting looking from the outside in but when the inverse is true it becomes too close to reality to be at all comfortable. I just wish that the distances involved weren’t so great, having the option to shorten the obligation into a more manageable chunk seems a vision in paradise. Ah well no amount of whingeing will make it go away.