Who's Line is it Anyway?

2005

The move south has been stressful for Dad. He lived in the same house on Sylvan Avenue in Terryton (small New England town), for forty one years. During those years my mother catered to him on hand and foot and attended to his every need. He found fault with my mother and it is fair to say that he treated her with great disrespect. If she cooked a meal he was not pleased with, or a meal he was not in the mood for, it was shoved across the table and often onto the floor. He was never pleased. My father is not a 'happy' person. He finds fault with everything. I foolishly thought that he would come here and be happy. What was I thinking? He has been here for two months, and according to him, everything is wrong. It is too hot, too cold, too sunny, too rainy, nothing is quite right. So in fact, his happiness level has not changed. What has changed, is that myself and my family are the targets of his frustration and general discontent.

At least once a week he is threatening to move back to New Hampshire. My husband usually sits down with him and calms him down and gets my father to think rationally for a few days. Eventually something arises that upsets dad and then we are back to "getting the hell out of this place!" This evening during dinner he tells Lee that he is moving because he doesn't have a phone hooked up in his apartment. Dad has his own cell phone, which he uses about once a week. The only phone call that comes into the house for my father is on Sunday evenings when my brother calls. I speak with my brother for a while and then bring the cordless phone down to dad. Tonight, there is a great need for him to have an extension down in his apartment. Dad agrees that if the phone is hooked up, he might stay for a few more weeks.

After dinner Lee begins running the phone line downstairs. It isn't a huge job and certainly not difficult. Lee recruits some help from my teenage son Matt and within no time at all the phone line is connected. Once the job is complete, Lee tells dad that everything is set up and dad says, "It's about time." Lee and Matt clean up the mess and leave Dad downstairs to make his "important phone calls."

Within ten minutes, the house phone rings. We wait to see if Dad picks up the phone. The phone keeps ringing and ringing. Finally we tell Jay (my nine year old) to answer the phone. He picks up the phone "Hello? No, you have the wrong number. Hey PaPa is that you? No PaPa, I'm not Lynn, it's me Jay, I'm upstairs. I think you dialed the wrong number. OK, Bye." Lee and I look at each other. Jay says, "It was PaPa, he thought I was Lynn." Lynn is my father's Internet friend. After my mother's passing my father was hot on the trail to "find a woman". Within three months he began exchanging emails with a Vietnamese woman who lives in California. They exchange phone calls every now and then. Three minutes later the phone rings again. Jay answers, "Hello? PaPa, it's me Jay again. You are dialing the wrong number. I don't know who Lynn is." Lee looks at me and tells me that I better go see what's going on down there.

When I get downstairs Dad has his cell phone in hand, looking at his phone list and dialing a number. The phone list is something that I made up for Dad and taped to his wall. In big red marker are written the numbers that he may need to dial. I ask him "Dad, what's going on?" He looks at me, clearly irritated, "I'm trying to call Lynn, but somehow Jay keeps picking up the phone." I ask him to show me Lynn's number and he points to our house number, which is labeled "Our house phone number." He continues to dial and say the numbers out loud "2.......2.......5......" I interrupt him and say "Dad you are dialing our house number, the phone right here at the house." "DON"T BOTHER ME, I'M CALLING LYNN! 2........2.........where is the 5 oh yeah, 2..........5.........." The house phone begins to ring. I stand and look at him and the phone continues to ring. He whispers, "It's ringing." I whisper back, "I know." The house phone rings a few more times and he yells, "ARE YOU GOING TO PICK THAT UP OR NOT!" I calmly tell him, "No. I'm pretty sure I know who it is!" He stomps over to the newly installed phone and places it to his other ear, "Hello?" "Hello??" "HELLO???"
He then listens to the cell phone and speaks, "Hold on, I've got someone on the other line." Then he turns to me and says, "Somebody picked up Lynn's phone and these other people won't talk!" Finally he slams down the house phone and focuses on the cell phone and then realizes that they have hung up. He is so upset he has to sit down. He is out of breath and shaking. I point to the house phone number and explain "This is our house number. This is the number you dial to call that phone (pointing to his new phone). This is the number you just dialed on your cell phone." "NO, I called Lynn." "Ok dad, show me what number you dialed." He points to 'Our house phone number'. I then point to the number listed as 'Lynn's number' and tell him "THIS is Lynn's number." He says, "Right, that's who I am calling." At this point I decide to give up. He doesn't understand, he isn't going to understand. I ask him if he would like me to dial Lynn's number for him, he nods and hands me the cell phone. He says, "Maybe Jay won't answer if you do it."