My Son Smokes

My son smokes.

Now that is probably the biggest insult to a man in uniform:
to have a pothead for a son.
Especially your first-born.

So I beat him
to make him see the folly of his ways.
I sent him to the best schools, and this is how he repays me.
So I enforced on him a new and improved
Drug-Free lifestyle.

However, when I woke up one morning,
the painting hanging from my bedroom was gone;
the first thing I saw in the morning for the past ten years,
a painting of my favorite band
painted by my son for my fortieth birthday.

And when I asked him,
"Where is the Sgt. Pepper painting?"
He just shrugged his shoulders and answered,
"You said Drug-Free."

Now that made me realize
my son is a true artist,
and what he does makes him no different
from my alcoholic sister or my philandering brother.

My son still smokes marijuana.
Just never in front of me.


*circa February 2004