When I was Still Your Golden Boy

As of Friday, I've officially made the transition from student to alumnus.

Today, I overheard my parents discussing it downstairs. My father commented, <All the boy does is sleep all day. He doesn't go to class, he doesn't study, how the hell is he going to work?>

<He's your son,> my mother sneered.

<And what is he thinking? Why didn't he take the ___ job offer?>

<That's the old way of thinking, old man. You can't define his success by numbers anymore. He has succeeded in that he gets to choose and decide. You and I didn't get that luxury growing up.>

It was odd hearing my mother defend me. Growing up, she was always the harsher of parents, grilling me for every mistake.

I never saw, however, that I stood in such a seemingly negative light in the eyes of my father. I never thought that he might have perceived me as the lazy slob son. Or maybe it was just that that was my father's way of accepting that I had exceeded his expectations and, perhaps, done him proud. My parents never were the type of people to express endearing words.

When my mother saw me later, she made an off-remark about how I don't look as much like my second brother as I used to.

My brother and I shared a lot in common. We share names, in fact. Conveniently, I grew up to be -- according to friends and relatives -- his spitting image, twelve years younger. As a child, I even picked up a lot of the same mannerisms as my brother; the silent composure, the head cocked back and to the left, the low, sharp tone we take when upset.

My brother got in trouble constantly in his teenage years; escorted home by the cops twice, kicked out of the house on occasions, and eventually packed his things and left home in the middle of night.

In high school, I fought a kid in a park because he said I looked at him funny. I stared at him just to provoke it. A year later, the cops phoned home to let my parents know that I had jumped a few fences to elude them. And some time later, I was caught sneaking out and back into the house at freakishly late hours of the night.

It seemed, after some point, that my parents had written me off as just another black sheep. They had five other children, after all, who could hold it against them for one bad apple?

Today, as my mother remarked about my appearance, I wondered if that were her way of telling me I'd finally come out onto my own.