Quality time

A couple of decades ago when I was an undergrad at Alabama State University, my father sat me down for a heart to heart conversation. At that time, he voiced his concerns over some of the decisions I'd made and the direction that my life might take as a result of those decisions. It wasn't the only heart to heart conversation we had, but it's one that I've clearly remembered through the years.

My father wasn't a particularly sensitive man. He wasn't the type of person to talk about his feelings and he had an old school view to life. The way my father saw it, men were men and women were women and we all had roles to play in the scheme of things. My father actually worked in Montgomery where I went to school, so he asked me to meet him at his office. When he saw me, he took one look at my hands and asked me if I had taken leave of my senses.

You see my girlfriend at the time was a cosmetologist and on a regular basis she cut my hair, gave me facials, gave me pedicures and she routinely filed and painted my fingernails with a clear polish.

One of the men that my father worked with saw what transpired and overheard what my father said to me and he asked my father what would he do if I was gay. My father looked him dead in the eye and said "I'd shoot him". The man laughed, but I looked at him and without cracking a smile told him "he wasn't joking, he was serious".

Fast forward to the present. Earlier today I had lunch with my son, Reggie Jr. He came home from school this weekend because I summoned him home. I say summoned him, because when I asked him to come home last week, he made a lame excuse for not being able to come. He knew very well that I was very very upset over some of his recent decisions and concerned about the direction that his life might take as a result of those decisions. So as a consequence of all of that, I insisted that he come home.....thus the summons. As I said, I took my son to lunch today and when I did I let my son pick the place, he chose Hooters. It's not the first time he and I have eaten there together, it's probably the third or fourth time. Truth be told, he likes chicken and ( @ )( @ ) just as much as I do. The conversation that we had today wasn't particularly pleasant, but it's a conversation that I believe was most necessary.
Sometimes fathers and sons need to sit down and have a conversation. Some of those conversations are going to be pleasant and some of them are going to be fierce. There's nothing wrong with a man having a fierce conversation with his son; as a matter of fact, it's essential to a young man's life. I would hope that the conversation my son and I had today will stay with him for the rest of his life.