My father and I had a public argument on Facebook. I’m not ashamed about this, as I have a general policy of not being ashamed of my feelings. My aunt (his sister) sent me a message requesting that we only do this kind of thing via email because other people didn’t need to be involved in it.

Um, hi, I’ve said some of those things to my dad in emails. I’ve said some face-to-face. I’ve said some calmly. I’ve screamed some of them. My dad and I say these same things over and over again. This is the same argument that we’ve been having for years, and will likely be doing for years to come. This is basically our schtick. This is how we do things. This is the sum-total of our relationship.

I’m sorry if my family or friends don’t realize that he and I don’t always get along. Honestly, though, if you’ve known me more than a minute (real life or online life), you know that my dad and I aren’t best buddies. We don’t always do things the nice way. Sometimes, the only way we can communicate is to do it loudly.

I have sent private messages to my father that started out similarly to the way my declaration on Facebook started. I told him about a month ago that I was not going to cook again until I got a full-night’s sleep. That full-night’s sleep didn’t come for another week or two. I still had to cook. I knew that he either didn’t read it, or didn’t take it seriously. Since my dad is always telling me about things that go on on Facebook, I knew that if I posted it on there as a status update, he would read it. I needed to know that I got my point across to him. It doesn’t matter if I tell him something a million times if he never gets the message. This time, he got the message. This time worked. I’m sorry if our argument upsets others, but if this gets his attention, then this is a victory for me.

Besides, I really don’t like that he lists that he’s a family man, when the family he communicates with happens to be members he’s never met anywhere but on Farmville. (Even though we’re in the same room most hours of the day.)

I bet my father didn’t get chastised at all.