"Shooting Dad" By Sarah Vowell

This was an interesting essay to read, but mainly for personal reasons. I enjoyed her expressions and extreme views that were being released on behalf of her younger self who had since become her older self. Though grown up, she still was able to stay truthful to her beliefs as a kid, attempting correct judgment and individuality while being raised by her father, someone she saw as, let's say, faulted.
The personal reasons I mentioned were based on the fact that I could relate to this character very well. The "oh my god, my dad and I are the same person" thing probably happens to most daughters raised by fathers they think they hate. This can be a turbulent event for some people, but thankfully for others such as Vowell and myself, it can be just an ironic joke from the universe more than anything, something to shrug your shoulders and grin at.
I feel that in her description, her and her father both had disillusioned themselves into believing more and and more that their way of living was right, simply because their lifestyles became a tug-of-war. He called her in mocking joyful tones when a republican won an election, and she pasted left wing newspaper clippings on her door because she knew he would see it. Whatever they did became a display more than an internal passion, and that usually creates more connectivity and coherence between people than they'd like to admit.
I didn't much care for the title of this essay because it suggested that she actually shoots her dad at some point, which I was actually waiting for when she mentioned the first time she ever fired a gun. I wasn't excited for a violent event, just a funny one where someone gets minorly injured. I understand that all the title is doing is giving away the ending in a playful way, but it led me on and now I resent it.
The best part of the essay was the moment Vowell experienced the God-like firing of a cannon, something she had feared and refused as a child, but now realised was, in her own words, "just really, really cool." This was a moment shared, a silent moment of bonding, and very sweet to visualize.