I stopped the truck in the middle of the road.  “Oooo!” sounded liked I was going to drive his truck through the glass, nails and rocks to blow out all four tires.  “Oooo!” to him meant that I didn’t see the turnout and I needed to start making the U-turn. I blew up at him since he still didn’t trust my driving.  When I drove down the street and made the U-turn in a parking lot, he had the decency not to argue with me this time.

The common experience from my other relatives is that when a person reaches the age to be an Angry Senior Citizen, they loose the ability to ask for help and communicate verbally.  Seldom does Dad ever ask for something.  He wants me to read his mind and decode the various throat clearing, Morse code tapping and other noises that he creates to gain attention. When I don’t respond the way he wants me to, he gets mad at me.

After putting up with this for two months, I was going bonkers.

We had visited every Wal-Mart in the area except for the one in Morgan Hill that was smaller even by Wal-Mart standards. This Wal-Mart on Story Road turns out to be a short freeway hop from my place. I thought it was further out since it was on the east side of San Jose. According to expert opinions when I was growing up in the 1980s, east side is the wrong side of the railroad tracks (Mom at home) and the “ghetto side” (Geraldo Rivera on national TV). Times have change and the area looks better than I remembered. The store itself was cramped for space since it was being convered to a super store.  That’s good since the nearest super store is about 30 miles in Gilroy. I might start shopping here in the future when I have money to blow.  I usually spend $100 USD whenever I’m at a Wal-Mart. Dad was shopping to restock his trailer when he returns home.

Naturally, Angry Senior Citizen had to drive like a bat out of hell on the electric shopping cart.

The doctor cancelled his appointment the next morning and he did what I’d been telling everyone for months what he would do: loaded up his truck and took off down the road.  He left behind trash and dirty laundry, and stiffed me on the rent. He claimed that paying $800 USD to fix my car was enough compensation to cover the second month’s rent.  I told him that those repairs were for pre-existing conditions that he should’ve fixed before he gave me the car.  Since he was tighter than Ebenezer Scrooge with money, he never gone to the mechanic to fix a problem that he could’ve gotten on by with. Never mind that I did his taxes to get an $800 USD return that covered the car repairs, and saved him $1,800 USD in car insurance when I help him switch to AAA.

Of course, none of that counted to Angry Senior Citizen.

That was two weeks ago. My place is finally back to normal after a thorough cleaning to kill all the dust bunnies and remove all traces of Angry Senior Citizen.  Except for the carpets that had dribbles from the wheelchair.  I don’t have the extra money to rent a rug cleaner yet. Meanwhile, I’m driving up to Sacramento every two weeks to make sure Dad is doing okay. The first time I went up to his place by myself was on the Saturday before Mother’s Day, he paid me $50 USD for gas and wanted the spare change back.

Some things never change.