My parents are about to hit their 60s and pretty much have no interests beyond television. My dad rattles off movie trivia and lame jokes while my mom lays on the couch watching the next drama movie or TV show that has the same exact plot as the last one. I, being 20, spend a lot of time away from them. I enjoy playing video games, watching YouTube, martial arts, and reading books. I also am enrolled in online school and have to put time towards that. Since most of my hobbies are solo ventures, I spend a lot of time immersing myself within them. To me, improving at something I'm interested in is a better use of my time than having a conversation with my parents. It sounds cold, but I can't help but feel exhausted when I'm around them.

I already dislike television, but I hate it even more when I have to listen to my parents make note of every little thing they see, not actually paying attention to the content of the movie or TV show, but acting like they're the show, if you know what I mean.

At the dinner table, my energy dictates the energy of the household. My mom rattles off yes or no questions about whether or not I'm following through on my various responsibilities with school/work. Occasionally she'll throw in a "How's this going?" question. I wish that she and my dad would take more of an interest in my hobbies, but you can't get everything you want. Anyway, if I'm engaged in the conversation, everything is fine and dandy. However, if I show that I'm not engaged in the conversation, my mom keeps asking me more and more questions, and her tone becomes interrogative. Mind you, it feels like the same conversation every day. "How's school going?" "Good" "Did you schedule this?" "No, I haven't looked at it yet. I've been focusing more on this lately." "You know you can do two things at once, right?" "Yes, I know." Next question.

Side note: if I'm focusing on two important things at once, my mom says I need to focus on one thing, and if I'm focusing on one thing, my mom says I can focus on multiple things at once. It feels like her advice to me is first and foremost based on the assumption that I'm wrong.

Continuing, though. On Christmas Eve, at the dinner table, I wasn't in a very good mood, mostly because I didn't feel like dealing with my mother's interrogation. So I was giving one word answers to all her questions until she asked what was wrong with me. I can't remember exactly what I said but I believe it was something along the lines of, "I feel like we don't really talk about anything real." I can't remember exactly what I said, but that was definitely how I felt. Anyway, in a long, drawn out conversation, my parents kept telling me that, if I want to be social, I need to talk about nothing sometimes. Just engage in pointless small talk in order to get to the real stuff.

To be honest, they do have a point. But why do I have to engage in small talk with my family? My parents don't seem to realize that they don't have anything to talk about other than TV. And they also don't seem to realize that, my dad never really had any friends, and my mom's only friends were lowlifes that hated her and she hated back! They think that I treat them like I treat everybody else, but no, I don't like giving you two conversation because you two have no idea what it takes to have a meaningful and healthy conversation! And my mom was so much crueler when I was younger. Makes me want to disappear from her life.

On one hand, I know they both lived awful lives and I don't want to see them die alone. On the other, they are both so blind to how they treat people. My father will never confront you but he will hold a grudge, while my mother is always trying to win conversations. It's exhausting talking to two people who are so disingenuous. I feel like I'm the glue that's holding this family together. As the youngest child, I feel like I shouldn't be the one with this responsibility.