I will dress in my loose-fitting Levis and tight sweater. He will remark that my hair looks good, it being a Thursday night and all. "Fluffy," he'll say. "Your hair looks fluffy." Later he'll promise "good" was what he really meant to say all along and I'll tug at my sweater, make fun of his bowling trophies, and think about my back, still stinging from the Berber carpet his mother installed after watching seven consecutive episodes of a This Old House marathon. He will fiddle through his old album collection, pull out The Allman Brothers, Live at Fillmore East, and recall how he once lit up with Greg Allman at a concert hall in Baton Rouge, or how he wanted to, but couldn't, because he lost his backstage pass to a girl named Rita. And then I'll complain: someone must have heard us, the carpet is dirty, he doesn't respect me, and now my hair is fluffy and my back is sore, and only my father listens to the Allman Brothers. With the tips of his pointy fingers he will trace the curve of my spine. "Like the shell of a snail," he'll say, "only not as smooth." And then we'll eat turkey and canned cranberry sauce from Styrofoam plates, our knees occasionally touching beneath a portable card-table as the record sticks on the opening line of “Statesboro Blues": wake up momma, turn your lamp down low, wake up momma turn your lamp down low.