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Sometimes I look at him and I wonder what goes through his head. I look at him and I feel confused. I feel like yelling at him. Or physically attacking him. Neither'd be of any use, I know.

He's completely unreasonable, stubborn and unwilling to see things from a different perspective, much less consider the situation from the point of view of others. He's a bigoted twit most times. And the most ironic thing? He insists otherwise.

It's as though he enjoys making the people around him miserable.

I grew up not knowing him. He bludgeons his way back into our lives and all of a sudden, I'm expected to act as though he has been there at every step of the way. At my early stages of life, while I still needed guidance for most of the decisions and choices I had to make, he was preoccupied with other things. By the time he stepped in again, I'm sorry to say that I grew enough of a brain to be able to decide most things for myself. Whether he likes it or not.

But I love him. How can I not?

Unfortunately, he makes it so easy to hate him.

I'm no longer an infant nor a child. Not a pre-teen nor an immature brat. If there's one thing my mother successfully brought me up to be, it's to be an independent, and mature thinker. Not be a spoilt, whiny moron that still views the word through rose tinted lenses all the time.

That, however, does not make me a complete fatalist or cynic. I'm still a girl. Sensitive and prone to bouts of PMS, wants and needs.

And I want and need my God. I live for Him and love Him. How can I not?

He is so easy to love, because He loves me unconditionally and has been there everytime I look to Him.

So if he can't accept that, I cannot but defy. I will not renounce my Lord, even for a loved one like himself. He can continue to blame it on everyone else around him save for himself, but it will not change things. I can only pray that he will see the light. Somehow, some time. How do I let him know how important this is, that it is not hypocrisy or a waste of my time? How do I assure him that I do love him?

No matter how many times he brings me to tears, threatens me, threatens my mother, yells at my brother and creates public spectacles... some things will never change. And this is one thing I will not give up.

I am seventeen this year. No longer considered a minor, even in the eyes of the law. If I have to stay out late because I had a meeting, a training session or because I wanted to spend time with friends, it does not mean that I have no care for him or that I have absolutely no wish to spend with him. I have just... grown up a little more.

Perhaps I grow overzealous with my social life, but it does not make me love him any less. I am no longer a child that spends all her time at home. Instead, I have been given independence. And a curfew. Which I do keep, to the best of my abilities.

... Never have I had to report to more than one parent. But now I do. So I live and learn. Unforuntately, habit is hard to break.

But I can say this: I cannot read his mind. With vague references and wordless demands, I am completely unable to know what he wants. It makes no sense whatsoever that he expects me and my siblings to carry out his every whim when we don't even know what these whims are.

Hence, I can also tell you this: His expectations are unattainable.

There is always this feeling of helplessness and frustration every time I talk to him. His words hurt, like clamp or vice over my chest. There is also resignation when I hear a commotion outside my door, be it him and my mother or him and my brother. Same old thing, over and over again.

Have I really failed as a daughter?

... Has he succeeded as a father? As a son to his own mother?

Does the fault really lie with me?

I don't have answers. Perhaps there are no answers. Whichever the case, it stands that I have no inkling as to what to do now.

I try to ignore it. Fail miserably. I have so many things to do aside from locking myself in my room so that I can wallow in misery and self-pity. I hate looking at my brother and watching him cry, hate watching my mother trying to make light of the matter, hate watching my grandmother plead with my mother to not take him seriously.

It's like another drama serial all over again.

Now he refuses to pay for anything. Not my bowling, not my trips, not my anything save perhaps for the household bills.

I grew up in luxury; had whatever I needed and wanted. I am now more sure than ever that it was my mother that taught us not to depend too much on it because such things are never 'forever'. So when it was taken away, it did not seem like my life had ended. It had merely changed. That is not to say that money is completely unimportant, however. Sure, I can do without having more than enough money. I can live by the fact that I actually have a budget.

But how do I turn to my mother who is already working so damnably hard? How do I ask her for money when I know thinly she has to spread her income? My school supplies, my music, my bowling fees, my bowling equipment, my allowance? How can I, when I've heard the words "barely enough"?

I really can't.

What's the use of doing well in everything else? What's the use of gaining self-satisfaction from my studies, from my bowling and leadership achievements when I look at him and feel like I'm never enough?

Somehow, I'd rather he were still out there working into the early hours of the morning, doing whatever it is he did with his elitist group of friends.

Because right now, I'm just very, very tired.