Session

"Does this happen to a lot of people?" he asks me quizzically, after an impromptu and intense counselling session (Mum groggy with her splash of wine, not to mention emotionally tenderized for the grilling after an equally ad-hoc one-on-one-over-yong-tau-foosession with me just prior). "These identity issues, a lot of people face?"

"Oh yeah, sure," I answer assuredly, wondering where in the back of my amateur Psychology Today newshound archive I might substantiate my assured claim. "Most couples go through this sort of conflict, especially at this point in their lives. You are facing three major impasses in terms of how you each view (1) your gender identities, (2) your roles within the marriage, and (3) your aging process and conscious self-realization."

He nods, maybe he grunts, and Dad grips and protrudes his jaw as he whittles his already short teeth to philosophical chalk. He's a do-er and a thinker, not a feeler, he already stated during this session, and from somewhere deep in the personal investment I have in the "clients" before me I hope that in swallowing that uncapsuled residue my Dad might come to appreciate the fine art of following the feeling-pill right down to his belly.

Navel gazing: it exercises your longus colli throat muscles and elongates the cervical spine ... not to mention draws your awareness to potential double-chin rooster gobbles that grow with age and gravity.

Mum starts gasping for air because with three instead of the usual soporific singular slosh she has managed to put herself into mild cardiac arrest, or perhaps refluxed her gastroesophageal, or very possibly provoked her last remaining latent menopausal symptoms, and in this distress calls session to a close and abandons her further bitchings for later ... fifteen minutes later, on the couch, whinnying and woozy. In recollection, elegant Wong Kar Wai soundtracks iPlay and I find it no wonder that I enjoy paradoxes and pathetically cruel realities, like the image of a poisoned mouse dying to the tune of Ne Me Quitte Pas. Bee-whizzing violins and sultry saxophones continue my mind-music video staring at these two bodies lodged on yesterday's couch into the realm of fantastical melodrama vignettes: the alternately hateful and loving couple I have always known as my parents.