It's Healthier If I Do

I don't know if my father is exceptionally funny or incredibly rude. Having to live with him, it's healthier for my sanity if I think he's funny.
     When we were visiting my sick uncle at the hospital, my father reached over and grabbed his younger brother by the wrist. He then looked at his own wrist, as if he were a doctor taking a patient's pulse.
     "Either you're dead," he told him, "or my watch has stopped."
     We all got a good laugh out of that one because he was imitating Groucho Marx and we were all big Groucho fans. The Marx Brothers made some of the rare movies that my father and I have been able to bond over. Even Zeppo couldn't ruin them for us.
     Sadly, that didn't cheer my uncle up for long.
     "It's not good news," he told us, gravely.
     "What is it?" I asked him, but I already knew. The news of his illness had already made its way through the Family grapevine.
     "Cancer," he told me.
     I nodded my head in sympathy. He then looked at my father, who was always considered the head of the clan.
     "Do you think there's anything I can do?" he asked him, hopefully.
     "Well," my father told him, "I could take you to Truth Or Consequences for some therapeutic mud baths."
     Truth Or Consequences is a small town in New Mexico that is known for its natural mineral springs that shoot up hot out of the ground. A lot of people, sick and healthy, go there for a dip in its healing waters.
     "Do you think that will help?" my uncle asked.
     "Probably not," my father answered, "but it will help you get used to lying in dirt."
 
 

Raising My Father

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He's Sick, Not Dead

My Dad's younger brother had been doing poorly for a while now, so, when he ended up in the hospital, I offered to take my father to go see him.
     "What for?" my father groused. "He's sick, not dead."
     "He's not doing well, pop," I told him.
     You think he's not doing well," my father said. "What about me? I haven't been able to go to the bathroom for a week."
     Too bad my dad's not lactose intolerant like I am. A glass of milk would solve his problem pronto. Anyway...
     My father finally relented when my wife interceded and told him he should go. She's like a good angel sitting on his shoulder, convincing him to be a better person. Myself, my father would probably tell you that I have a devil on one shoulder and an even bigger devil on the other.
     "You never know," my wife wisely concluded.
     "All I know is my laxative's not working," my Dad complained.
     At the hospital, my uncle greeted us warmly, if weakly. He looked happy to see us, but he looked frail. There was a plate of uneaten food near him.
     "How are you feeling?" my father asked him, concern in his voice.
     "Not too good," his baby brother admitted, lifting a weak hand.
     "You think you don't feel good," my father told him, "I haven't been able to go to the bathroom for a week."
     "At least I don't have that problem," my uncle bragged, perking up. "I'm regular, like clockwork. Every morning, at exactly 8am, I empty my bowels."
     "Yeah," my father told him, "but you don't get out of bed until 10."
 
 

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All Day, Every Day

Our house was a little cool today.
     Let me repeat: cool, not cold.
     Why?
     Well, since you ask, we had to leave the front door open because of the workmen we had working on our bathroom.
     My Dad, when he wasn't busy standing at the bathroom door telling the workers how to do their job, complained about the temperature all day long. I mean, aallll day long. Myself, I like a cool house, but that means nothing to my Dad.
     "It's cold in here," he said.
     "Dang, it's cold in here," he said, only he didn't use the word "dang."
     "Are you cold? I sure am," he said, taking a stab at passive aggressiveness.
     Yeah, I know, Dad. It's so cold Congress is keeping their hands in their own pockets.
     And then he bellowed, "Hey! Where's my ice cream?"
     Despite the chilly temperature, he wanted his servants to know he still expected to be catered to hand and foot.
     My Dad. First, he complains about how cold it is, and then, in the next breath, he's demanding ice cream. Go figure.
     Before you report me to the authorities, let me just tell you that my father has four or five sets of new sweats (myself, I have two, neither of which are new), several nice windbreakers (myself, I have none, but that's a fashion preference), new long pants (myself, I prefer jeans), on and on, but, no, when it's cold he chooses to wear shorts and a t-shirt. He could be wearing only his boxer shorts and a wife-beater, I guess. Thank God for small favors.
     Finally, tired of no one acknowledging his complaints, my father went into his room to put on some appropriate clothing and a hunter's cap. He likes to wear them with the ear-flaps down. My Dad's never been hunting a day in his life, so I don't know where he got that Elmer Fudd hat.
     "Where did pop get the hat?" enquiring minds wanted to know.
     "I bought it for him," my wife answered.
     "Were you being nice, or were you trying to get even with him for some reason?"
     Let me tell you, for a woman she sure can hit pretty hard.
     As I was rubbing my shoulder, I couldn't help but notice that my father was wearing a single glove. Single, as in one. Only one. Glove, that is. If gloves could go to a party, this one would have gone stag.
     Against my better judgment, I had to know.
     "Why are you wearing only one glove, Dad?" I asked him.
     "Well, son," he explained, "I was watching the weather report on TV, and the weatherman said it was going to be sunny, but on the other hand it could get quite cold."
     That didn't really happen, but it could have. Sometimes I worry that when he comes out wearing only his boxer shorts, we'll find him counting to eleven.
     You know, my father can watch TV in his room, on his big-screen TV, sitting in his very comfortable soft leather recliner, turn on the very nice portable heater my wife bought him, and adjust it to whatever heat setting he wants, just as long as he doesn't burn down the house. But he would rather sit in the cold, cold great room and annoy everybody, the workers included.
     My wife, saint that she is, bought him another portable heater.
     "Did he reimburse you for it?" I asked her, knowing the answer. My father hasn't opened his wallet since he had it welded shut.
     She just gave me The Look, lifting one eyebrow for good measure. A look and a gesture so devastating, I pray ISIS never gets ahold of it.
     "That's what I thought," I said.
     This portable heater she places near his feet. She even turned on the house heater for good measure.
     Now I'm hot.
     By the way, when the workers were finally done and handed me the bill, I could swear they doubled their rates to compensate themselves for having to put up with my Dad.
     Hey, they only had to put up with him for one day.
     I have to put up with him every day.
 
 

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Google It

I enjoy watching baseball on TV as much as the next guy, as long as the next guy is someone who doesn't enjoy watching baseball on TV. On the other hand, my elderly father who lives with me loves watching baseball on TV, and he'll spend many happy hours sitting in front of the television set doing just that. I pay extra for the Major League Baseball channel, and, believe me, it's worth every penny.

     I want to spend time with my dad, but I don't want to sit in front of the TV for hours doing nothing, so I'll grab my laptop and join him. He'll do his thing, I'll do mine, and somewhere along the line we'll even exchange a few words.

     Recently, during a commercial of course, he asked me, "What do you do with that?"

     "What do I do with what?" I asked him back.

     I must admit, I wasn't paying much attention.

     "What do you do with your computer?"

     Finally, a subject I actually had some interest in.

     "Well, pop, right now I'm doing some research on Google."

     It's true. My dog had developed an allergy to his food, and I was researching grain-free, limited-ingredient, hypoallergenic dog foods. Whoever said dogs are no trouble have never met mine.

     "What's Google?" my father wanted to know.

     "Well, Google is what's called a search engine," I explained. "You ask it a question, and it gives you the answer."

     "I don't believe it."

     "It's true."

     "Any question?"

     "Any question," I assured him.

     My dad thought a bit, and then said, "You know, my brother has been sick."

     "I know, dad," I sympathized, thinking my father had changed the subject.

     "Ask Google how he is."

 

 

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My Dad In The War (Part Twenty)

I've already told you the story of how my father diarrhea-bombed the Japanese during World War II when he was stationed in the Phillipines, and this story happened around the same time.
     My father and his platoon were camped near a cliff. I don't understand the logistics of how the foxholes were laid out, but that's where they were. For some reason, the Japanese soldiers they were fighting were camped at the bottom of that cliff. For the most part, they left each other alone. There was no order on either side to attack, and no one wanted to die, so each group tried to pretend as best they could that the other group wasn't there.
     It's pretty boring being a soldier. When you were camped, there was absolutely nothing to do. You could talk with your buddies, but after a while you begin to hear the same stories being repeated over and over redundantly, just like this sentence.
     During this period, with the Americans at the top of the cliff and the Japanese at the bottom, the Japanese soldiers must have been just as bored, because one of them began singing their National Anthem.
 

"Kimigayo wa!

Chiyo ni yachiyo ni!

Sazare-ishi no!

Iwao to narite!

Koke no musu made!"

   
     Maybe he was trying to ease everybody's boredom. Maybe he was trying to raise everybody's spirit. Whatever it was, it must have worked, because all the Japanese soldiers were soon singing their National Anthem.
 

"Kimigayo wa!

Chiyo ni yachiyo ni!

Sazare-ishi no!

Iwao to narite!

Koke no musu made!"

   
       I don't know if you've ever heard traditional Japanese music, but it pretty much sounds like cats caterwauling to Americans, and I'm sure the Japanese thought the same thing about American music in the 1940s, especially if they heard anything by Spike Jones & His City Slickers.
     When my Dad and his buddies heard the Japanese soldiers singing, they looked at each other with pained expressions. Some of them stuck their fingers in their ears, and others pinched their noses shut in the universal sign of, "This stinks!"
     "Watch this," my father told his buddy Bennett, and then sang out, "Ay! Ay! Ay! Ai-eee!" like a Mexican mariachi singer.
     The Japanese soldiers stopped singing.
     My Dad and his friends started laughing. They could almost picture the Japanese soldiers beneath them looking at each other in befuddlement with big bug eyes.
     "Good one, Duchene," one of the soldiers told my Dad.
     Needing no more encouragement than that, my father, in full voice, started singing a Mexican folk song.
 

"Alla en el rancho grande!

Alla donde vivia!

Habia una rancherita!

Que allegre me decia!

Que allegre me decia!"

     
     The platoon was busting a gut laughing. Some men were rubbing away tears from their eyes and others were holding their stomachs. Bennett had a hand on my father's shoulder for support as he cracked up.
 

"Te voy a hacer tus calzones!

Como los que usa el ranchero!

Te los comienzo de lana!

Te los acabo de quero!

Alla en el rancho grande!

Ay! Ay! Ay! Ai-eeee!"

 
     With an exaggerated flourish, my father wrapped up his musical debut with a sweep of an imaginary sombrero. His buddies, their laughter tapering off, gave him a round of applause. And then...
     And then, hesitantly at first, the Japanese soldiers started applauding my father's performance, too. Some even trying to imitate his mariachi cry.
     "Goddamn those Japanese," my father told me, years later. "They were vicious killers, but they had good taste."

 
 

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Happy Thanksgiving!

We are having our Thanksgiving dinner this afternoon at 1600 hours. (That's 4:00 pm, for you non-military types.)
     My wife is not only a saint, but she's also a first-class cook. Ask anybody whose eaten her food. Anybody, that is, except my Dad. You could give my father a million dollars, and he'd complain about the taxes he'd have to pay.
     Another plus about my better half is that she's just like me. On-time. If dinner is scheduled for 4:00 pm, I like to be sitting down and eating at 4:00 pm. My wife is the same way.
     I once went to a Thanksgiving dinner where the turkey was going to be prepared in an oil-cooker, which, from what I hear, is pretty quick and makes for a tasty turkey. I had never had a fried turkey before, so I was looking forward to it. The dinner was scheduled at 5pm.
     We got there on time.
     No turkey.
     We ate some nuts in a bowl.
     No turkey.
     An hour passed.
     Still no turkey.
     My wife and kids ate some more nuts and another hour passed...
     Where the heck is the turkey?
     Finally, after 8pm, somebody shows up with the turkey-fryer.
     All right!
     Everybody's nice and hungry and the show's about to get on the road, but, you know what?
     No oil.
     So that same somebody has to leave to go get the oil to fry the turkey with. By that time, it was late and my family was hungry. They had been hungry for a while. A bowl of nuts only goes so far. So we made our excuses, said our good-byes, and found a restaurant to have our Thanksgiving dinner in. I didn't even get to have a slice of the pumpkin pie I made, and I make a pretty mean pumpkin pie, even if I do say so myself.
     I hear the turkey was finally ready a little after 10pm.
     Later, my mother, who was still alive at the time but didn't go because she knows how this particular family is when it comes to time-management, told me, "Did you try the turkey? I hear it was delicious."
     My punctual wife?
     I guess I'll keep her.
     Which is a long way to tell you that...
     This morning, I heard someone skulking around downstairs at 0600 hours. (That's 6am, for you non-military types.) Heck, it was still dark. I picked up my Alaska Brown Bear Rifle and went down to check.
     "Oh, hi," my father said, when he saw me. He was all dressed up and ready for his Thanksgiving dinner.
     In the dark.
     With the whole house asleep.
     Sometimes, I have to feel sorry for the old guy.
 
 

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Baby, It's Cold Inside

If you read the last story, maybe you saw the same pattern that I did.

     When a person is a baby, they ask you "Why?" all the time, and when a person gets elderly, they ask you "What?" all the time.

     Most times, I'm sure it's because they can't hear. Other times, I'm sure it's because they just plain don't want to hear. If he's learned anything watching Law & Order, it's that you can't be held accountable in a court of law to what you haven't been a party to.
     As I write these words, my father is sitting in the great room. I know the weather in other parts of the country is very severe with cold fronts if you're lucky and snow storms if you're not. That's why I live where I do, Here, the weather has been nice. It's not even cool, it's actually warm.

     Don't hate me because my weather is beautiful.

     From where I sit, I can hear my father complain.

     "It's cold," he says to no one in particular.

     Since he doesn't direct his comments to me, I ignore him.  It's not because I'm a jerk, although I know it can be construed that way. I've just been through that conversation a thousand times before.

     "It's cold," he's said.

     "Why don't you put on something warmer?" I've said back.

     "What?"

     "Why don't you put on something warmer?"

     "Something what?"

     "Something warmer."
     "What's warmer?"
     "No, why don't you put on something warmer?"

     "What?"

     So forgive me if I don't volunteer to be frustrated.

     The funny thing is, when my wife and I don't want my father to hear something, that's when he gets the kind of super hearing even a Shaolin monk would be jealous of.

     In the old 70s TV show Kung Fu, a blind kung fu master asked the boy version of David Carradine's Kwai Chang Cain, "Do you hear the grasshopper by your feet?"

     The young apprentice didn't, but my father could have if that grasshopper had been whispering something it didn't want my father to overhear.

     "Whisper, whisper, whisper," the grasshopper might whisper to his grasshopper wife, "and that's where I hid our grandson's Christmas present."

     "Are you sure you hid it far enough in the back of the top shelf of the closet?" my father would want to know.

     "You weren't supposed to hear that," the grasshopper would tell him, throwing up its grasshopper arms in exasperation.

     "What?"
     That's when the grasshopper might want to go out for a pack of cigarettes and do what Bruce Springstein's does at the beginning of his song Hungry Heart. With a hungry heart, he sings...

     "It's cold in here," my Dad says, rubbing his arms, bringing me back to the present.

     I watch him from the corner of my eyes as he complains. I look around the house. The doors are closed, the windows are closed, the fans are off, and, shoot, to tell you the truth, I'm hot..

     "Mumble, mumble, mumble cold."

     I feel like telling him,"You wouldn't be cold if you would just put on some warmer clothes, old man."

     My father is wearing his usual winter outfit: a thin t-shirt, shorts to show off his skinny legs, and sandals. Shoot, I'd be cold if I was wearing that get-up, even if I was wearing it in 85-degree weather.

     My wife looks at me, and I look at my wife.

     "I've bought him all kinds of warm clothes," she's told me before and is telling me now. "His closet is full of warm clothes."
     "What?" my father says.
     "It's cold," my wife humors him.
     "You bet it is."
     To me, she mouths the word, "Packed."

     It's true. My father has sweat shirts, sweat pants, heavy-duty 32-degree long-sleeve pullovers, light-weight jackets, and thermal tops and bottoms. He has Under Armour shirts made with a space-age material available only on Matt Damon's Mars. He has the same kind of clothes that were worn by Bob Hall the final time he summited Mount Everest (He died on the way down, but we only tell my father about the first part.). On and on. And on. Plus, my father has an electric blanket he refuses to use on the armrest of his--my--favorite chair.

     "Man, it's cold," my father says again.

     I shake my head. My Dad is cold because, like a stubborn baby, he chooses to be cold. The older a baby gets, the less cute its antics become. Nothing more annoying than a 96-year-old baby. Unless it's me, when I'm 96-years-old. I bet you I'll still be pretty darn cute.

     My wife has a sixth sense about things. She knows I'm about to open my big, fat mouth and say something I'll probably regret later, so she gives me The Look. Then she gives me a double-shot of The Look, just in case I didn't get it the first time.

     She's right.
     It's better that I don't say anything.
     Because if I did say something... I probably would regret it later.

 

 

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November 22, 1963

Being sent back in time to Dallas to stop President Kennedy from starting a nuclear war with Russia that will devastate the world.
     Wish me luck.
 
 

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And Some Days Just Are (Part Three)

Somehow... someway... I don't know how he did it, but my Dad found one of his great-grandson's Christmas gifts.

     I bought my grandson a dual-propeller helicopter a few months ago and hid it in plain sight. I actually wanted it for me, but, since I'm too old to play with toys, I have to pretend it's for him.
     Anyway, my better half became suspicious when my father was in his room all by himself in the middle of the day. You see, my father is very rarely in his room. If he wants to take a nap, he'll just plop himself himself down in the middle of everybody and their monkey, and expect the world to come to a standstill so he can sleep. He usually remembers to wear his pants, but sometimes he forgets.
     My wife became suspicious because, you know how it is with children, when you hear them go quiet you know they're up to something.
     Well... my father was being quiet.
     "Are you okay, Dad?" my wife called out as she opened his door.
     She was afraid to look, because we've recently heard about some children who caught their elderly parents having sex in an old folk's home, so she didn't know what kind of gross thing he might surprise her with.
     "Hunh? Ah? Wha?" my Dad said.
     "Are you okay?"
     She could see that he was standing over his bed with his back to her, messing around with something.
     "Yeah, yeah... I'm okay," he said, shifting his body to block her point of view.
     "What are you doing?"
     "Me? Ah, hmmm... nothing."
     My father was trying to open a box and was very concerned with what was inside of it. He could see that it was some kind of a mechanical mechanism with metalic parts, but he just could not figure out what it was. He must have thought ISIS had left it there.
     "Um... what are you doing, Dad?" my wife asked him again, recognizing the box in front of him.
     He told her he had found the box and that it contained a very complex machine. He wanted to figure out what it was, but first he had to figure out how to get it out of its cardboard container.
     When my father was twelve-years-old, his uncle used to let him borrow his car IF my father would keep up with the mechanical stuff. In those days, my father could take apart a piece of machinery and put it back together better than before. Today, my father was having trouble opening a box.
     Life is cruel.
     "Where did you find it?" she asked him, knowing that I had my grandson's Christmas gift hidden in the closet out of reach of my grandson.
     "I was looking for something," he told her, not really answering her question.
     "You were looking for something?"
     "Right."
     "What?"
     "What?"
     "Yes, what?"
     "Did you say 'what'?"
     "Yes, what were you looking for?"
     "What was I looking for, you say?"
     My wife looked at him with those steely eyes of hers. Eyes that have brought lesser men to tears. (Not me, of course.) My Dad shuffled uncomfortably from one foot to the other, and then back again.
     "I was looking for my dog," he tells her.
     "You were looking for your dog?" she sputtered.
     "Yeah, why?"
     "Why were you looking in the closet for your dog?"
     "What closet? I wasn't looking in the closet."
     "You must have been looking in the closet, because that's where we hid the box."
     "What? Oh, yeah, I was looking in the closet. Sometimes my dog likes to go in there."
     For the record, his dog has NEVER gone into that closet.
     "How did he get to the top shelf?"
     My wife was just teasing him now. She knew that the box was hidden in the top shelf of the closet toward the back.
     "What do you mean?"
     "Well, that's where we had our grandson's Christmas gift hidden. How did your dog get up there?"
     My Dad hemmed and hawed, trying to come up with an answer. My wife eventually felt sorry for him, and changed the subject. Sort of. She was annoyed to find out that he was snooping around through our closets, but as long as she didn't find him in her underwear drawer, she could put up with it.
     "Your son bought that," she told him.
     "Who?"
     "Your son."
     "What about my son?"
     "He bought that."
     "Bought what?"
     "Bought that toy."
     "Toy? It's a toy, you say?"
     "It's a toy for our grandson, Dad," she told him.
     "A what?"
     "A toy."
     "It doesn't look like a toy."
     "Well, that's what it is."
     "What?"
     "A toy."
     "It's a toy?"
     "Yes, a toy."
     "It sure doesn't look like a toy."
     After fifteen, but more like twenty, minutes of explaining to him that it was a toy for his great-grandson, he finally answered, "You don't have to tell me what it is. I know a toy when I see one. But who's it for?"
     "It's for your great-grandson."
     "I have a great-grandson?"
     Actually, if he wanted to count how many great-grandchildren he has on one hand, he'd have to pull down his zipper, that's how many he has.

     Later that night, after finishing the five-star dinner my wife is always gracious enough to cook for him, his eyes pop out and he gets a Halloween look on his face. He's still not done with us.
     "Ah, hey!" he exclaims loudly, his muppet-like arms flying all over the place.
     My wife and I look at each other.
     "Hey now, how about some ice cream?"
     "Did you want some ice cream, Dad?" my wife asks him politely.
     My father ignores her question.
     "Where's my ice cream?" he demands. "Aren't you going to give me some ice cream?"

     "If that's what you want," my wife tells him.

     "Damn right, that's what I want," he says. "Mumble, mumble, mumble ice cream."

     My wife serves him his ice cream with a little bit of the magic dust his doctor prescribed as a topping. Twenty minutes later, my father is sound asleep like a baby in front of the TV.

     The magic dust helps him, but it also helps us.

 

 

Raising My Father

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@JimDuchene

 

Some Days Are Worse (Part Two)

The TV in the great room is blasting.
     It's on a cooking show. My father, who's never cooked a meal in his life and never will, likes to watch shows like Top Chef or Cutthroat Kitchen or anything with Guy Fieri, who's given my father many hours worth of entertainment wondering how it's possible to have bleached hair with black roots.
     "How does it grow that way?" he'll ask no one in particular.
     "He colors it that way," my wife will explain to him
     "He does?" my father will respond, seemingly amazed at the idea. And then: "But how does it grow that way?"
     I like Top Chef, but mainly I like that hot girl who tells all the cooks to take their knives and stick them where the sun don't shine. An insult coming from a hot model somehow seems less insulting. If she told me, 'Take your knives and go," the only thing I would hear would be: "Chocolate cake."
     On the cooking show my Dad is not watching, a woman who looks like the cartoon character Dr. McStuffins from the Disney channel is one of the cooks. The other two are a skinny white guy and a fat white guy with a bald head and pony tail. I don't mean to imply racism by pointing out that these guys are white, but they are. I don't judge a man by the color of his skin, I judge him by whether or not he wears a pony tail. My father, meanwhile, sits in front of the TV looking like he's agreed to go toward the light, and I'm not talking about the one on the TV screen.

     I'm hungry, but instead of seeing what Ronald McDonald is up to, I decide to make myself lunch. It's early, but it's clear to me that the coast is clear now and might not be later. My father is out like Jeb Bush's presidential ambitions, and the TV's volume will block out any noise I'll make. I prepare my feast and put it in the toaster oven to heat.

     I'm sitting at the counter, waiting. My back is to my father in an attempt to not lose my appetite. That's when I hear a VERY LOUD gargling sound.
     Please, no.
     There's a swishing of liquid and then a smacking of lips.
     "Ahhhhhhh!" I hear him say. Smack! Smack! Smack! I hear him go. Click! Click! Click! I hear him, well, click.
     I sit... I wait... and, like David Carradine as Kwai Chang Caine in Kung Fu, I listen, hoping the noises and the exclamations, like General MacArthur's old soldier, fade away. My lunch is almost ready. Maybe I can wait him out.
     But no.
     I hear a shifting in his--my--favorite chair. It's my father, like a geriatric Godzilla, coming back to life.
     I wait, very quietly.
     I hear him gargle his drink very loudly. He must have his mouth open. Occasionally, he stops to swish the liquid back and forth. He then smacks and clicks his lips together several times before he starts the process all over again.
     The whole thing makes me feel like gagging.

     I know he must do it on purpose, but just how he knows when I'm getting ready to eat is beyond me. Maybe he sits there, with one eye open, pretending to be asleep. Maybe, in the dead of night, he inserted some kind of a James Bond tracking device just under my skin where I wouldn't notice, and then proceeded to lay in wait. Maybe he does it to make me leave the room. Which I did.
     I'll eat later.

  

  

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  American Chimpanzee

@JimDuchene

 

Some Days Are Better Than Others (Part One)

Some days are better than others.

     My father and I were sitting at the kitchen table. It was just after lunch, and my father was drinking a cold glass of ice tea and I was enjoying a hot cup of gourmet coffee, my only indulgence. I was also reading the morning newspaper, which is a rare thing for me to do so early in the day, because my father is known for hording the morning newspaper like it's the last roll of toilet paper during the zombie apocalypse. When, out of the blue, he asked my wife,"What are those things?"

     My wife looked at the table and then around the kitchen counter, but didn't see anything out of the ordinary or unrecognizable. I looked, too, but saw even less.
     "What is what?" she asked.

     "Those green things?"
     "What green things?"
     He pointed at the decorative bowl in the middle of the table. It was filled with limes.
     "Those," he said.

     "You mean the limes?" my wife asked him.
     She looked at me, her eyes starting to water. I was still trying to figure out if my Dad was serious or not. He's been known to pull our legs on occasion. He's also been known to pretend he doesn't know something to get out of doing something else, but, try as I might, I couldn't see what was in it for him to pretend he didn't know what citrus fruit was.

     "Those green balls in the bowl," my Dad said. "What are they?"

     "Those are limes," she told him gently.

     "Limes? Hmmm... did you say limes?"

     "Yes, Dad. Limes."
     "Limes..." he repeated, processing the information.
     "Dad," she told him, "you've had limes before."

     "I have?" He considered this. "What are they good for?"

     My wife tried to explain them to him, but everyday, commonplace things are hard to explain. Try explaining the word "the," if you don't believe me.
     "Dad, limes are... well, limes. You've had them in your tea."

     "Oh? Hmmm..."
     He looked at the glass of tea in front of him, but didn't see any green balls in it.
     "You squeeze them and add the juice to your tea," she explained further.
     "I don't do that," my father said, sniffing as if doing such a menial task were beneath him.
     I must admit that's true, because my Dad's motto is: "Why do things for myself, when I can just get my daughter-in-law to do them for me."
     When my wife is out and I'm in charge of taking care of my father, he's perfectly capable of doing things for himself. Not everything, you understand, but the basics, like squeezing a wedge of lime, for example. He has to, because I won't do them for him. But when my wife is home he's been known to call up the stairs for her to fetch him a bowl of ice cream, and, yes, I did use the word "fetch."
     On this occasion, it may just be a case of my father forgetting how to squeeze a lime because the last time he had to squeeze one for himself was when General MacArthur kept his promise and returned to the Philippines.
     "I know you don't do that," my wife told him, "because I do it for you."
     That was pretty bold, especially for my wife. Usually she'll just agree with him and then vent to me later about it. I'll listen, but only because I hope to rewarded later.
     "Ahhh," my dad finally exclaimed, as if the veil of forgetfulness had lifted, but more probably to change the track the conversation was taking. "Limes."
     He looked at me.
     I looked at him.
     I nodded.
     He nodded back.
     He turned his attention back to my wife.
     "Where do they come from?" he asked her.

 

 

 

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  American Chimpanzee

@JimDuchene

 

Hungry Heart

I've been sitting here for over an hour watching cartoons. Let me tell you, spending my day watching cartoons is not what I envisioned I'd be doing when I retired.
     My grandson likes cartoons the way my father likes his baseball games, and, having said that, let me tell you, my father is especially happy that the Mets are in and the Cubs are out, despite what Back To The Future predicted. Let this be a lesson for you. If you base your reality on a movie's fantasy, you're going to be disappointed.
     When my father watches his games, we give him the peace and quiet he wants. He can hear me when I'm upstairs whispering sweet nothings in my wife's ear, but he can't hear the TV blasting in front of him from a distance of less than ten feet.
     Go figure.
     With my Dad, it's a one way street. We watch what he watches, or we can go watch something else someplace else. Sometimes my father surprises me, and he'll sit and watch cartoons with us. That's what he's doing now. Either he likes the company or he likes the same cartoons we're watching.
     Right now, I happen to be hungry. It's only 1400 hours (that's 2pm for you non-military types), and, since I'm trying to lose weight, I eat at this time and "try" not to eat later. Sadly, my wife's a great cook, so "trying" not to eat later is like trying not to breathe now. It's also hard, because my father is a very enthusiastic eater. Put a plate of food in front of him and he'll inhale it like he's Matt Damon on Mars. But I'm not talking about him, I'm talking about me, and thanks to my doctor I'm reduced to eating fruits or veggies or indulging in the occasional protein drink. When I'm in the mood for a snack, I have to go outside and lick a tree. My Dad, on the other hand, can eat anything he wants. If you've ever been told that life's not fair, you were probably told that by someone who knows me.
     Somehow my father has gotten on to my routine. He used to take his nap between one in the afternoon and three, but now that he knows I eat around two, he'll sit and he'll wait, and he'll sit and he'll wait, and he'll sit and wait some more. He sits and waits, and waits and sits, and sits and sits, and waits and waits. Why does he do all this sitting and waiting? Because he's hoping I 'll cook something. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I wait him out.

     My father knows that if I make something for myself, I'll always make enough for him. I have no idea where he puts it all because at 1600 hours, he'll eat again. 4pm is when my beautiful wife serves him his early dinner. He's served like he's the King of the Knights of the Round Table. He's served in the great room, as he sits in his--my--favorite chair, and on the Rolls Royce TV tray we bought him. I say "we" bought it for him because he never reimbursed us for the expenditure. My wife serves him his food hot, like he likes it, and his drink so cold there's condensation dripping down the sides of the glass, if, in fact, glasses do have sides. And she does this all without him missing an out or a hit on TV.

     I look up because my father just mumbled something. My grandson is so intent on the cartoon he's watching that he doesn't even notice. Or maybe he noticed, but has learned from me that sometimes it's better to pretend that you didn't. My Dad's mumble is followed by a couple of long, loud, deep sighs, and a yawning, "I'm tired, maybe I'll go take a nap. Ohhh...   ahhh..." he says. "Woweee. Great googly-moogly, maybe I should take a nap. Mumble, mumble, mumble," my father mumbles some more. Click, click! Smack, smack!

     "Let's go watch TV upstairs," I tell my grandson, and he agrees. When my father starts making his noises, I know it's time for me to exit, stage left.
     As we're walking away I hear my father start to gargle, he's gargling in the great room. What the hey? He stops, and then I hear him start up again. His gargling is getting louder. I better pay closer attention to him. My first order of business is finding out where it is that he's spitting whatever it is that he's gargling?
     "I'll meet you upstairs," I tell my grandson, giving him a little push in the back for encouragement.
     "Aww..."
     "I'll get us some ice cream."
     "...aww-right!"
     I'm now watching my Dad with the same interest I watch those model/hostesses on The Price Is Right with. I see my father take a drink from his cup. I think he's drinking tea. He tilts his head back, gargles, and then swallows. He takes another drink, this time swishing the liquid around inside his mouth before gargling and drinking it. He does this several times.
     Perhaps my father is appreciating some fine expensive wine that I don't know anything about. Just when I thought things could not get any stranger, it's turned out that my father has become a late-in-life wine connoisseur.
     No, it just tea.

     I think about Bruce Springstein's song Hungry Heart. It begins:

 

"Got a wife and kid in Baltimore, jack.

I went out for a drive and I never went back."

 

     And then I think about my grandson waiting for me upstairs.

     And I get the ice cream.

 

 

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.blogspot.com

jimduchene.blogspot.com  American Chimpanzee

@JimDuchene

  

My Dad Needs A Room

Take one step forward and two back.
     Isn't that the real world?

     To make a very long story short--just because I like you--a water pipe in our house developed a pin-sized hole and it semi-flooded two of our bedrooms and two of our bathrooms. In math terms it would look like this: one house - two bedrooms - two bathrooms = I'm screwed. And not in the fun way. The water must have been spraying behind the wall for weeks, because the damage, while hidden for the most part, was extensive.
     When I first noticed the water damage, I turned to my wife and asked, "What's my father been up to?" But, as it turned out, it wasn't my father after all. Just a faulty pipe. I felt bad. My wife made me feel worse.
     We had a plumber fix the leak. He charged us extra because my Dad tried to help. Then the restoration team showed up to determine the damage. I think they were the same guys who put Sputnik into orbit for the Russians. They told me that preventing mildew is harder, so we have numerous fans and dehumidifiers stationed in the bedrooms, the bathrooms, and the garage. It's a seven day operation. God was able to create the universe in six.
     Go figure.
     "That's what you get for buying a cheap house," my brother told me.
     "Cheap? My garage is worth more than your entire house," I pointed out.
     "I rent."
     "Exactly."

     We had to relocate my father from his bedroom in the main house back to the little father-in-law house in the front of our property. He moved into the main house for reasons I won't go into now, because I don't feel like crying. I like to call his little house La Casita. My father likes to call it I'm Not Moving Back. I told him he could always invite one of his girlfriends to spend the night. The funny part is he actually considered that. Now, what kind of girlfriends can an almost 97-year-old man have?
     Before you answer, I heard a recent news story out of Arizona, where the children of some elderly residents of an Old Folk's Home are complaining because they discovered--the hard way--that their parents were having sex.
     I'm sorry. I've seen elderly humans. No, thank you. The only way I'll be having sex when I'm 90 is if my girlfriend is 19. That's why I told my wife, "You better take advantage of me now, honey, because your expiration date is coming up."
     For some reason she had a headache that night.
     My brother and I talked about this geriatric sex thing. He hasn't had sex since approximately 1976. Not because he doesn't want to, but because his wife is always afraid the children will hear.
     "But your children haven't lived with you for twenty years," I told him.
     "Exactly," he told me back.
     That's why I tell all my dating friends, "Don't be in such a rush to get married. Your sex lives will diminish in direct proportion to the length of time you're married. And when the first baby comes... forget it."
     The reason, I tell them, is this: When you're dating, you have sex at every opportunity because you don't know when the next opportunity will come around. When you're married, you can always put off sex "for later." Somehow, the later comes around, but the sex never does.
     So my brother finds it hard to understand why his wife--a relatively young woman--doesn't want to have sex, but these old ladies do.
     "Easy," I tell him. "It's because they're trying to attract a man, and they're doing it the way nature intended."
     I don't want to give the impression that my brother is slow, but I have to explain it to him. These woman are all widows. Single men their age are few and far between. Between what? Who knows. Just between. Their husbands are all dead, and for some reason they would like to have another one. That sounds to me like having an irritating pebble in your shoe, taking it out, and putting it in your other shoe.
     They first try to accomplish this with an old adage they've heard all their lives. "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach." Like my ex-wife, it's old and it's wrong. The way to a man's heart is not through his stomach, it's through his zipper, and these old ladies figure that out soon enough.
     You see, when a man's wife dies before him, which is a rare occurrence in an Old Folk's Home, all the elderly widows will make a sympathy stop, bringing with them casseroles and homemade desserts. This is their way of showing him they're good marriage material. When that doesn't work, they tell the new widower that if he should ever need anything.... This is their way of telling him they put out. So imagine the shock and awe their children experience when they come to visit and see a dirty old man taking their dear old grandma the way Grant took Richmond.
     That makes me think about my father. I don't know if those old ladies would be able to put up with him. People with Alzheimer's can be real hard to live with, but, at the same time, we can all be hard to live with when we our brains are faulty and misfiring. Maybe those old ladies wouldn't mind after all.
     I once told my wife I couldn't wait for her to have Alzheimer's.
     "Why?" she asked, not knowing whether she should be offended or not.
     "Because," I explained, "after we have sex, you might forget and want to have it again."
     For some reason she had a headache that night.

     By the way, just for the record, I'd like to clarify that my brother's not slow. Just cheap. Or, as he likes to put it, frugal.

     I think he put a voodoo curse on my house.

     We had a crew working on the walls today. They should be finished tomorrow. Then it's on to the next repair. My brother is very fortunate. He lives in a rental home, and all he has to do is cut the grass and pick the weeds.
     This is why I want my next home to be a rental.
     By the way, my father needs a room.
     Can he stay with you?

 
 

Raising My Father

RaisingMyFather.BlogSpot.com

jimduchene.BlogSpot.com  American Chimpanzee

@JimDuchene