Old Age Takes Pity On No One

 Lest you think I consider my father a burden, I don't.

It's just if all I wrote about were unicorns and rainbows, both you and I would be bored. Besides, I find everything my father does incredibly entertaining. Maybe not at the time, but when I look back. 

You know the saying, "I'm not laughing at you, I'm laughing with you."? Well, I'm not laughing at my father, because I'm just like him. I'm laughing with him, because I can see what the future has in store for me.

Old age takes pity on no one.

One of the reasons we bought the house we're living in now is because it had a small guest house in the front where we knew my father could live and have his privacy. It was a way of him keeping his independence, and yet letting us keep an eye on him at the same time.

In his home away from home he has his own TV with its own satellite signal. Now that I think about it, his TV gets more stations than mine does. He has a radio/CD player. Telephone. Refrigerated air. Heck, it sounds so good, I think I'm going to go live there.

The problem is that he likes to watch TV in the great room of the main house (you know, my house) and that forces everybody else to watch TV someplace else. And, while he's busy watching TV, he's also busy complaining that our house is too cold.

"Why don't you put on a sweater, dad?" my wife will ask him. "Do you want me to get you one?"

"I don't want to wear a sweater," my father will say.

"But if you're cold, a sweater might help warm you up."

"The problem isn't that I'm cold, the problem is that the house is cold."

So my wife will feel sorry for him, turn up the heat, and the rest of us have to suffer.

"Pop," I've told him, sweating like a pig. "Maybe you'd be more comfortable watching TV in your room."

"No," he's told me. "I'm comfortable here."

"You could watch what you want to watch."

"I do that here."

"You could have the house as warm as you want."

"I don't know, it's pretty warm here. Except when it's cold."

So what can I do? 

I sit in a hot house watching something on TV that doesn't particularly entertain me. And, man, I hate the heat. I try to avoid it like it was the police. You can dress for the cold. You can put on a sweater. You can wear a scarf. But there's nothing you can do about the heat. 

When it's hot, it's just hot.

There's times I beat my father to the TV. He'll stroll in, sit down, and watch for a bit. And then he'll look at me, and then back at the TV. At me, and then the TV. Me. The TV.

"There's not a baseball game on?" he'll ask me.

He knows perfectly well there's a baseball game on. We have entire channels devoted to nothing but baseball games. So at any give time, my father can watch one if he wants to... and he always wants to.

"This show's pretty good, pop. You should give it a chance."

"Oh, okay." And he'll watch. For awhile. And then he'll look at me, then back at the TV. At me, and then the TV. Me. The TV.

"There's not a baseball game on?"

My wife will finally feel sorry for him and change whatever it is I'm watching.

"Can you also turn up the heat?" he'll tell her. "It's too cold in here."

Once again, I can't watch my programs. I think he pretends to watch baseball on the outside, and laughs at me on the inside.

"Heh, heh, heh," he laughs to himself. "Heh, heh, heh."

Trust me, I understand why my father prefers watching baseball. He's a bit hard of hearing, so it's hard for him to follow the stories on the programs I watch. Baseball, he understands. And when he can't hear the color commentators, he makes it up himself.

"You know," he'll say, in between chewing on the snacks my beautiful wife provides. Smack, smack, smack. "These games are fixed."

"Are they?"

"Yeah..." smack, smack "...fixed. I don't even know why I watch them."

I don't know either.

The bases are loaded. The batter hits a home run.

"See? I knew it. I knew that batter was going to hit a home run. I had that feeling..." smack, smack, smack "...The games are fixed..." smack "...I knew they were going to win the game."

"You did?"

"Ahhh, yeah. They're all fixed so the owners can make more money." He'll laugh, and shake his head a bit. "I don't know, I don't know. How else can you explain their scoring four runs and winning?"

"Maybe the batter just hit a home run. I mean, somebody's got to win."

"Nah, they're fixed. How else can you explain it?"

By this time my wife will have already gone upstairs to bed. I'll decide to join her.

"Goodnight, pop," I'll tell him.

"Huh? Ahh... what?"

"I'm going to bed now. Can you turn off the TV and lights before you go to bed?"

"Sure, son. Don't worry."

And then sometime in the middle of the night I'll wake up to check the locks on the doors. I'll find the TV on. The lights on. The heater on. The door leading out of our house and to his will be unlocked. With my father no where to be seen. He's in his room. Sleeping like a baby. He knows how to turn everything off, but for some reason he doesn't do it.

Maybe that's his way of paying me back for leaving him to watch TV alone.