a rant and a half
old man seems to be doing a bit better this weekend. he remembered me for the first time ever! then he asked me what i was doin' over in Walla Walla, and i had to remind him i was from Pendleton. kinda cool, even though i only have a little less than a month left here... i gave my notice a few days back, so that i can finally have one or two days off, per week. i've nearly forgetten what that's like. i'm gonna miss this goddamn old man, though.
last Sunday i was serving him dinner, when he went into one of his trademark seizures. kick-kickin the counter and spasming awkwardly back in his chair. before i could hold him down his arm thrashed and knocked his milk, macaroni and applesauce to the ground, all the china shattered and created such a big mess. well, after he calmed down i got down on the floor to clean up the shit. "wh-what'd ye do?" he asked. i told him what had happened. "i'm sorry," he said, and got up to help me clean the shit. "goddamn it," i said, "stay in your chair!" not a moment later, his knees buckled and he had another seizure, rolling around in the spilled food and cutting himself on shards of glass and porcelain. i cleaned up, cleaned him off, made him a new dinner and muttered to myself.
this weekend they put him on oxygen tanks. it seems to help a lot. he also takes lots of sedatives all the time, so he's really chill, yet strangely lucid. yesterday, however, pure fucking bullshit wouldn't leave me or the old man alone...
there's this couple, not much older than me, who come out here from 9pm to 6am to take care of the old man every weeknight. well, they came out here yesterday in order to "git some cleenin' dun." i guess the man's girlfriend, who wasn't hired, isn't paid, and has no relationship to the old man or his family, said that if she was going to be coming out here all the time, the house needed to be spotlessly clean. the man doesn't seem to care. he's a construction worker and only took this care-taker (not giver, mind you) job because he needed extra cash. both of these people are large. i don't mean overweight. i just mean the man is about 6'6" probably 250+ pounds of solid muscle and his woman is nearly as tall. their arms are bigger than my legs... they both have big heads and big hands and probably big genitals. now, i know i'm little, but i get slightly intimidated and put-off when large, rough, hicks come stomping around in a delicate situation.
first, the giant man ranted to me about his construction job and made me get on the computer so he could show me their website and all the photos of the high-tech machinery. when old man's daughter (who lives in a different house, but on the same property) came by, and politely told him she wasn't paying him to surf the internet (which she's never told me), i felt guilty, as if it were my fault. he didn't apologize or even pretend he heard her at all. just kept right on showin me stupid shit...
finally, he got to work washing all the windows while his giant woman dusted and vacuumed. the whole time they're tense, like on the verge of a fight, speaking harshly to one another through clenched teeth. but whatever, i don't care about that shit. however, the woman is muttering ceaselessly, angrily dusting, knocking over picture frames and knick knacks. trying to make conversation, i asked her if she was allergic to dust. "no," she said, "i just HATE it. i never visit a house that's dusty. i make my friends clean before i come over." (wow, what a bitch) i thought to myself...
i must mention that the goddamn old man hasn't gotten up by 1:30pm or whenever these fucks came by. and i'm outside, reading The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You, trying to hide from them, when i hear angry shouting coming from a window on the side of the house. i wander over and notice it's the old man's bedroom window. i've never run so fast- back inside, into the bedroom.
the giant woman is looming over his bed telling him to get up so she can vacuum his room. she talks very quickly and yells at him over and over that he needs to get up and get some soup (?!)... he's confused, "shoes?" he asks, "i gotta put pants on first." "SOUP" she shouts. "Shoot?" he asks. so i tell her that if she doesn't mind, i'll handle the old man and she can clean another room. she says no, it's fine. i wanted to tell her it wasn't fine and to leave him the hell alone... but i didn't.
she uncovers him, makes him get up, he tells her he wants his clothes, she misunderstands and gives him a robe. i can tell he's pissed about that. she tries to force him over to the wheel chair. "hey, slow down." i said, right as his knees started to buckle. instead of letting him down gently on the mattress behind her, she starts yelling at him (her giant face is about two inches from his ear), "get up! GET UP! YOU CAN DO IT!" so i got on the other side of him and told her we should just lay him down. "i'm never gonna get to clean in here" she says. FUCK YOU! you have to take your time with the old man! --i want to scream, but bite my tongue instead.
finally we helped him up and into the wheel chair. he said he wanted to go back to bed, and the fuckin bitch said NO (?!?!?) i told her he could do whatever he wanted, it was his house, if he wanted to go back to bed, then-- and she would not fuckin listen to me. she grabbed the wheelchair and pushed him out into the kitchen and left him. he looked at me with the saddest expression. i asked him what he wanted to do. he shook his head. i gave him soup. he didn't want it. i gave him a sandwich, he ate it all. i bet the giants would've screamed at him until he ate the soup he never asked for...
it's one thing to put your foot down and not give in to a stubborn old man, for example, when he takes his pills, which he hates doing. but it's a completely different thing to be harsh and not to listen and not to take the time to deal with him with respect... maybe i'm fucking insane, but i keep seeing myself in 50 years in the old man. and i feel for him. he's a good guy, and it's a shame that in about a month he's going to be in these idiots' hands. at least the constructiony man wasn't too bad. he was nice to the old man, the few times i saw them interract... i just hope that he stops bringing his woman out here.
after all that, i still can't figure out why they didn't come clean the house on monday or sunday night after i was relieved... because all they did was come and disorient the old man, and then take my job away from me for the majority of the afternoon....
***
i've been meaning to write about my office job, in which i basically jack off and surf the internet all day and get paid $9 an hour, while pretending to work for the 3rd largest cell-phone company in the world... suffice to say, it's pure wackiness. my boss is one of the most easily distracted people in the world, and loves to talk. and gossip. and rant. you get the idea. so when i'm not reading endless news/blogs/comix/wikipedia i'm diverting her attention away from work and learning about her pedophile husband who she wants to murder when he gets out of prison, her allergies (she's allergic to the SUN) and the fact that she daydreams all day about fucking Raymond Burr or Morgan Freeman, she can never decide which is sexier. and she knows Raymond Burr's gay, but doesn't seem to care, even though, "fudge-packers... they just ain't right" but ultimately, there's "nothing wrong with that"... she's also related, through marriage, to my dearest dead best friend and never stops talking about him, asking me about him-- sheeeeesh. despite that last bit, it's a funny, retarded job that i'm looking forward to leaving.
however, last week, my boss tried to give me an offer i couldn't refuse. though i think i can and will refuse it, this is what they proposed: by the middle of next year they are opening 4-6 more cellphone stores up in Washington (they already have 9 scattered about). their proposition, because they like me, is that i could move up to Spokane, be the head of the office up there, doing essentially the same meaningless number crunching i'm doing now, get triple my wages, medical & vision benefits, and they'd even give me $500 cash, just to use for moving expenses. i think i'm gonna refuse, but it's sweet to know some psychotic folks think i'm worth a damn.
lots of shit to think about. ain't got no real future plans. nothing realistic. i live in a demented fantasy world, where Muhammad Ali is god and all the other folks are happy and exist as if on sing-a-long records....
gonna be exciting to get out of this town. again. i miss culture. i miss sake. i miss my little lady. i miss yakisoba. i miss Kubrick retrospectives. Body Worlds. Giant Robot. asian markets. organic anything. theatre. art galleries. used bookstores. public transportation. concerts. rain. madness. laughter. coffee shops. expensive parking.
i miss a lot of things. you, included. and if you made it this far, thanks fer reeedin'...