Uncle Donkey Kong sits at the kitchen table and lords over the Sunday paper.
He dissects it lazily, perusing the coupons first, then skimming the meaningless tripe in Parade magazine. He could be struggling with the front page while the funnies lie folded somewhere in the middle of the stack all morning, because he refuses to surrender any part of the paper until he reads it. The maddening thing is he'll dismiss anything that does not fall in line with his view of the world, even the funnies.
For example, he rejects the reports of the obesity epidemic among children, though he himself weighs in at a conservative 450 lbs. - hardly a paradox, it's just really stupid. I learned everything I know about the concept of denial from Uncle Donkey Kong.
While Uncle Donkey Kong was a Marine sniper, wounded in Viet Nam, my Dad got a deferment to go to college, which is as good as draft-dodging (not that I blame him for trying). Uncle Donkey Kong was my surrogate father while my biological father was globetrotting, dutifully serving the military/industrial complex by helping perfect intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Many years later, my Uncle wonders what happened. The only thing he truly has control over is the Sunday paper. My Dad is still a hawk, albeit a tired one. The aerospace Industry spit him out and he has no stories to tell about it. I don't like to think these are the people who shaped what I am, but rebelling against them must have something to do with it.
He dissects it lazily, perusing the coupons first, then skimming the meaningless tripe in Parade magazine. He could be struggling with the front page while the funnies lie folded somewhere in the middle of the stack all morning, because he refuses to surrender any part of the paper until he reads it. The maddening thing is he'll dismiss anything that does not fall in line with his view of the world, even the funnies.
For example, he rejects the reports of the obesity epidemic among children, though he himself weighs in at a conservative 450 lbs. - hardly a paradox, it's just really stupid. I learned everything I know about the concept of denial from Uncle Donkey Kong.
While Uncle Donkey Kong was a Marine sniper, wounded in Viet Nam, my Dad got a deferment to go to college, which is as good as draft-dodging (not that I blame him for trying). Uncle Donkey Kong was my surrogate father while my biological father was globetrotting, dutifully serving the military/industrial complex by helping perfect intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Many years later, my Uncle wonders what happened. The only thing he truly has control over is the Sunday paper. My Dad is still a hawk, albeit a tired one. The aerospace Industry spit him out and he has no stories to tell about it. I don't like to think these are the people who shaped what I am, but rebelling against them must have something to do with it.