Explaining About Dad

My parents house that I grew up in was by no means a dump as my Dad likes to call it. If you imagine upper class Brady Bunch style 1970s housing tracts you'll pretty much have a close visual idea of what our house was like. The house was a large two story place on a corner lot. It had just about everything a family could want in a house including a big in-ground swimming pool in the back yard. Dad always complained about living there, because no matter what he has it's never good enough. He could roll up in a brand new Ferrari and if you told him how nice his car was, he'd say in a gruff tone of voice, "Ah that thing is a piece of shit." He's like that with everything, including stuff he's made with his own two hands. Dad is a skilled guy with talent for woodworking. In his spare time he builds beautiful acoustic guitars geared towards playing classical music. If you compliment his work he'll say it's garbage. That kind of seems strange to most people. After a while people don't talk to him much about his projects and try to avoid him altogether.

At work I have to constantly stay focused on what I'm doing. My job requires me to be extremely detail oriented. Usually when I start my shift each evening I tune out most aspects of my personal life, family problems etc. I can't afford the distraction. If I dwell on family stuff or if Autumn is upset with me for some reason I can't think at work and everything quickly turns to shit. Making mistakes on the job can cost us dearly. Lost test time and possibly damaging hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of brand new equipment. In order to minimize any kind of distraction created by Dad I have deliberately kept him in the dark about my daily hours at work and what my phone extension is. If he had my work number I know what will happen. Dad will call incessantly just to push my buttons and rile me up. I don't need that.

Because my father enjoys cutting me down more often than not I stopped talking to him about what is going on in my life at any given time. When I told him personal details he'd remember them and twist them all around in his mind then use that information to beat me down. I slipped up a while ago when I told him Autumn didn't want to move in with me. He used that as another example of what an idiot I am. At the time when I talked to him about Autumn's decision, I was completely frustrated with her and I guess I didn't have anyone else to talk to about it. I should have kept my mouth shut. The funny thing is Autumn is just as financially irresponsible as I am at times. Maybe even worse. Her excuse for not wanting to live together didn't carry much weight. She just didn't want to make it happen and any excuse was good enough for her to weasel out of it.

I admit, I do have trouble managing my money. It's probably my greatest weakness that I need to work on. What Dad doesn't know is I have put away $40,000. If I need to I'll use that to retain lawyers. My aunt and uncle have nothing to do with backing me to go to court against my father. That's just his persecution complex doing the talking. In fact my aunt and uncle don't know much about what I'm up to. I'm going to keep it that way. The one thing I have asked them to do is send me any handwritten letters Dad has been putting in their mailbox. For months he's been harassing them by leaving mean spirited letters for them to read. When you read his crap you can tell some nutjob was behind it. I figured those letters might be useful in court so I asked for them. I have quite a pile sitting here now...

I enjoy shooting. Guns are one of my hobbies. I don't go hunting or anything like that. Mostly all I like to do is bring targets out to a range and blast away at 'em. Machine guns are what I prefer to plink with so a few years ago I picked up a couple. That's what Dad's AK47 comment was about in case you were wondering. I know some people are creeped out by those kind of weapons and others think it's real weird. For me it's mainly a convenience issue. Why stop every couple of minutes to put another five rounds into a rifle when I can just slap in a thirty round magazine and rip shit up? Anyway it's fun. Don't knock it 'till ya try it.

Dad doesn't know I have been talking to Mom's doctors and some of his neighbors on the down low for quite a while.

Talking to Mom has been tough. She doesn't remember how to use the phone anymore. To make things easier for her we programmed in our phone numbers so Mom could call me or my sister with the push of a single button. The phone would auto dial for her. Dad apparently went into the phone's settings and nuked all of the pre-programmed numbers which I thought was suspicious. He claimed "She didn't know how to use the damn thing anyway." Since then all incoming calls have to go through him first. With outgoing calls Dad dials for my mother and then hands her the headset. A few times I've heard Dad whispering what to say to Mom before she says the exact same stuff. He's been coaching her to tell me some really messed up stuff that I know she would never say on her own. That's been another of my top concerns that something is terribly wrong.

Instead of hiring a professional to help around the house with watching Mom so Dad can skip out for a break, his idea is to try to hire dishwashers from Mexican restaurants. He wants to bring in unprofessional people with no background in health services or medicine at rock bottom under the table hourly wages. That way it doesn't cost him much. The cheap fuck. We have all been vehemently against this, including Mom herself. That's why she has been fighting Dad about bringing in outside assistance. If he would simply pay for a real nurse trained to deal with Alzheimer's patients that would be a different story.

Recently Dad got particularly mouthy with me over the phone. I mentioned his mouth has been getting him into trouble in his neighborhood and I told him the story about almost getting his ass kicked by the Chief of Police. As I figured that didn't go over well with him. I thought it was amusing Dad wants to brawl the guy. I'd pay good money to watch him get his ass handed to him in a fight and then be placed under arrest for assaulting an officer. I'd probably laugh so hard that I would piss myself. See that's another one of Dad's ego problems. Even though he's into his sixties now he still views himself as a 1950s tough guy like Mike Hammer or some shit. It's a corny front I wish he'd drop because down underneath it all he's a big sissy.