It's our usual date of the week.
There was a time, pre-kids, when our date would have been something more romantic. Such as a candlelight dinner for two. A walk along the beach. A head free of aches.
Recently one night, as my wife was climbing into bed, I pointed out the two Excedrin Extra Strength tablets on her nightstand that I had left for her.
"What for?" she asked me, confused.
"They're for your headache," I explained.
"Headache?" she said. "I don't have a headache."
Let's just say she won't fall for that trick again. Anyway...
My Dad had been "heeing" and "hawing" at the kitchen table after breakfast, when he decided to annoy me from a different room in the house. He slowly got up and walked into the great room and sat in his--my--favorite chair and gargled his tea.
Gargled his tea?
Yes, he gargled his tea.
Why he does this, I have no idea. He'll take a big swig of tea, then swish it around in his mouth back and forth, forward and back, Simon and Garfunkle, and, just as you're wondering if he's ever going to stop, he'll cock his head back and gargle with it. This is something he never used to do, and the noise makes me leave the room.
Somehow, my Dad knew that my wife and I were going out. He sat like a character from a Robert Ludlum novel and pretended to watch TV. I could see him looking at what we were doing from the corner of his eyes.
My Dad's vision is poor, but somehow he's able to see into the future at my wife and I leaving for Costco. On a similar note, his hearing is worse than his eyesight, but somehow, when I whisper to my beautiful wife to meet me upstairs, he'll call out from his--my--favorite chair in the great room, "Why are you going upstairs?"
My Dad--along with my mother, I'd better clarify--had a bunch of kids. I shouldn't have to explain it to him.
This morning, however, he was complaining about his dentist who supposedly has his money.
My wife made the loving mistake of trying to explain to him that the dentist does not have any of his money.
"Yes, he does," my Dad told her.
"No, he doesn't," my wife told him back.
"Yes, he does," my Dad said again.
"No, he doesn't."
I could see that my wife was already getting tired of this particular conversation, and it had just gotten started. She looked to me for help. I pretended I was looking someplace else.
"The dentist gets paid for cleaning my teeth, doesn't he?" my Dad argued.
"Yes, but he's providing you with a service," my wife explained, looking into the future herself and seeing where this was headed.
"But I'm still paying him for that service, aren't I?"
"You have to pay for the service, Dad."
"But he still has my money, doesn't he?"
I've got to admit, my Dad had a point.
What he also had, and has, are 95-year-old teeth. They're all perfectly fine, as far as 95-year-old teeth go. In fact, his dentist is always impressed that as old as my Dad is, his teeth are still in such good condition, and always makes it a point to tell him so, so my father usually walks out of the office proud as can be, but he's lately been complaining about one tooth in particular. He can't clean it, he can't reach it, he can't see it but he knows it's there because it's been bothering him. He messes with that tooth so much that his imaginary problem has become a real one and it's begun to hurt. He tells us whenever we'll listen that the dentist has screwed it up and that's why it hurts.
"And that's why he has my money," he said. "It never used to bother me before."
The math doesn't add up, however, because the last time we took him to the dentist was about six months back for a cleaning. The problem with my Dad's tooth began late last week. What I think happened was some food got lodged between two teeth and instead of flossing, my Dad tried to fiddle with it. He'd come to our house from his little father-in-law apartment he has in the front of our property, sit at his--my--favorite chair and start making smacking noises. Then he'd make sucking sounds. Then he'd make sucking sounds mixed with smacking noises. I don't think there are letters in the alphabet to spell the kind of noises my Dad was making. Then he'd get a finger in there and aggravate it manually.
And that's what he's doing as we were getting ready. And that's what he was doing as were getting our coats. And that's what he was doing when my wife was telling him that we were leaving.
My father looked at her.
"Wellll... ahhhh... hmmmm," he said. Smack, smack, smack! Slurp, slurp, slurp! "G'almighty, it's cold. I'm taking the dog out for a walk."
What?
He had only been sitting and gargling his tea for an hour. Fiddling with his bad tooth, and complaining to us about his dentist. And now he decides to go for a walk? He knows we won't leave the house if he goes on a walk. That didn't bother him. He slowly got up and walked to his little apartment to get ready. Thirty minutes later, we were still waiting for him.
I told my wife, "Let's go anyway."
"We can't," she said.
"Why not?"
"What if he gets lost?"
"That will keep him busy until we get back," I told her. She knows I'm joking, but she still gives me a dirty look. Lordy, lordy... I've got vision, but the world wears bifocals.
He finally came out, grabbed his dog, and left.
The dog went, "Hey, what's going on? I was taking a nap."
He didn't really say that, but that was the look on his face.
My wife and I now had to sit and wait for him to get back.
Who runs this household?
Not me.
Back before I retired, when I would say something at work, it would get done. Now I find myself waiting on the whims of a 96-year-old man.
When my Dad finally got back, he found me watching the news. He looked, did a double-take, and saw that I was sitting in my--his--favorite chair. He took the leash off his yappy little dog, put it on the kitchen counter for my wife to put away because, as you know, that's her job, and came and stood by me. He didn't tell me to move, but I could see he was a bit irritated. Too bad. If he had let us leave like we wanted to, he'd be the one sitting comfortably on this chair instead of me.
"Some times you act like a big baby," my wife will tell me.
"That's because I am a big baby," I'll reply.
"I am getting such a headache."
So my Dad has no choice but to stand by me irritably. I take that back, he did have a choice. He could have chose to sit in the chair beside me, or on the couch that, let me assure you, is very comfortable. But he preferred to stand and simmer. Maybe next time he'll let us leave when we're on our way out.
I guess, I am a big baby.
On the news there was a special report about a 77-year-old African-American woman who began weightlifting late in life and was very strong. She had just begun lifting weights five years ago and could now dead-lift OVER 200 POUNDS!
This lady only weighed 105 pounds, and, just like Tom Cruise, was barely over four feet tall. As my father and I watched, she dropped to the ground and started doing one-arm push-ups, like Rocky, back when Rocky was still Rocky.
This lady did seven one arm push ups.
Personally, I can do... none.
"Would you look at that," I told my father, "she's 77 and doing one-arm push ups. I'm pretty fit, and I could do maybe one if someone was helping me."
"Hmmm," my Dad hmmms. "Ahhh," my dad ahhhs. Click, click, click! Smack, smack, smack! "I can do that," he said.
"You can?"
"Sure. I could probably do four or five right now, if I wanted to. It's not that tough."
Having put me in my place, my Dad snorted in disgust at his weakling son and high-stepped it to his bedroom to do fifty-six one arm push ups or take a nap.
A few minutes later, I was outside transporting the trash from the trash container in the kitchen to the trash receptacle outside. If there's one thing I've learned from watching Star Trek, it's that one day we'll have a transporting machine to do this kind of menial labor for us.
Later that night, I made my wife laugh by telling her that as I passed by his front door I could hear some moaning and heavy breathing.
"Oh my gosh," I told her. "I knew it wasn't the maid's day to show up, so I thought: Is my Dad doing another kind of one-arm push-up?"
She punches me in the arm for the disgusting image I gave her that she'll never be able to erase from her mind for the rest of her life. You know, for someone so petite, she sure can punch pretty hard. It wouldn't surprise me if she could do some one-arm push-ups.
"So I put my ear against his door and I could hear him saying to his dog, "Call 911! Call 911! I think I broke my arm trying to do a one-arm push-up!"
My wife was laughing at the image, even though she knew I was breaking the Fifth Commandment.
I was laughing, too, but I didn't care which commandment I was breaking. I already know I'm going to Hell.
Too bad I'll be taking my wife with me.
Raising My Father
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