Here Be Dragons

2007-12-24

Note to Mom: Please don�t read this to Dad. I�m just venting and I�m sure it won�t be the last time but he doesn�t need to hear it. I�ll get over it. It just turned into a rant that felt very good! So I�m keeping it.

Well, my side of the family went very well yesterday. We ate until stuffed and talked and talked and then exchanged presents.

My brother Dan made me promise not to buy Dad a bottle of schnapps. Dan is concerned that he�s drinking too much and of course since Dan has been sober for a year ANYTHING is too much, but I humored him. Dad loves Schnapps and it�s not like a rich man can�t buy his own bottle, but it�s the principal, in my brother�s eyes. I bought Dad shirts. Dan bought him pants. Our brother Bob bought him PJ�s in size X-Large. I told him to tell Dad they were a Large (long story further down). My youngest daughter bought him the bottle of schnapps *shrug* Oh well.

Dad is difficult to buy for and it�s not just because he has everything he wants. It�s because he is never happy with your gift. I bought him a 200 dollar trench coat one year and he wanted me to have it tailored into a car coat length. Impossible, the zip out lining would have had to be completely replaced. The cost would have made it cheaper to just buy a new coat.

The next year I bought him pants. He�s about 6�2� (hasn�t really shrunk that much with age) with at least a 32� leg but he wants not a 30 length but a 29 � leg because he wants to wear them down on his butt. How many stores sell a 38 waist with a 29 � leg?

NONE!!!!

This year my sister tried to give him some PJ�s. Dad is real proud that he�s lost some weight in recent years so he asked for a size Medium. This is a man that needs an extra long arm that a medium will never provide. But he thinks he�s absolutely skinny because he weighs near what he weighed in the service. NOT!! He lost a lot of muscle and some fat but he still has plenty of fat and the length of his arm will never change.

So what does he do? Does he say Thank You and silently admit he made a mistake? Does he ask for the name of the store so *he* can make an exchange? Does he throw it back on my sister by shipping it back for HER to exchange? No he takes them off in the middle of the night because he�s so uncomfortable and throws them in the back of his closet so he�s certain to never wear them again and then asks her for a SECOND gift of PJ�s in the correct size.

So when my brother who also bought him PJ�s but in X-Large told me the size I told him to tell a white lie and tell Dad they were a large or he�d have them handed back to him for HIM to exchange and he�d never be rid of the damn things if he bought them on sale and none were left to exchange for. I guess Northern Manufacturers make them a little roomier than down south. *cough cough*

What ever happened to basic courtesy? I have never in my life handed a gift back. I have never failed to say something appreciative of my gift even if it�s just a simple Thank You. I have never said, �I don�t want this� or �I can�t use this� or �I will never wear this� even if it�s true. I have never ridiculed somebody�s gift. Even if I KNOW it�s going in the Goodwill box the moment I get home.

The absolute worst thing that I would do is ask for the store so *I* could exchange it (not them) and I would make a point that it would be over the size not the horrendous taste of the article in question, even if it was true that it sucked and I would only do that with someone that I knew had a tough skin and/or I felt comfortable enough to be naked in front of. That leaves my daughters, my Mother and my husband. Everyone else gets a THANK YOU just because they thought of me. That�s the true gift.

I�m sorry but this is a real sore point with me. You don�t give someone a gift and expect it to be critiqued or summarily handed back to you. My brother Dan could use this lesson too. I handed him a Butt Out which is a 7 dollar joke gift for dressing deer that could be used but mostly it�s a JOKE and he handed it back to me saying he had one and to give it to someone who could use it!!! Then he spent some time wondering if the car seat cover would fit his car that our Mother gave him. I said, �Just say thank you for God�s sake!� Why don�t people get that the gift is the thought? Functionality has NOTHING to do with it!

Oh! Oh! And this is the next sore point. You want to share in the joy of watching them open your gift and see a smile and/or collect your Thank You. Now my Dad won�t even allow us that pleasure. He won�t open our gifts at the family get together. He takes them all home where I just know he still won�t open them and they�ll probably just collect dust in the back of his closet, unopened, because he has NEVER called me afterwards and said Thank You for the shirt (which is the ONLY thing he�s never handed back to me except for that bottle of schnapps. That�s why it�s all I give him now.) This was the fate of a very expensive electronic gift I gave him that would change the TV channel via voice command that I thought would be useful for a blind man but he never admitted that he couldn�t set it up and asked for help because then he�d have to admit that something was wrong with him and NOTHING is ever wrong with him even when he�s in the hospital for something that is WRONG with him!

GRRRR!

Then he won�t listen. I brought him home from yesterday�s Christmas get together and by a small miracle he actually asked for some help and wanted me to find the volume button on his new phone (which is what I wanted to buy him but he bought one himself even after I told him that was what I wanted to get him after we had a series of disconnected calls because his old phone wouldn�t charge anymore) I tried to tell him that it wasn�t that simple and that the volume was a choice under another Menu. The button had different functions depending on where you are in the menu.

He wouldn�t even let me finish. He started yelling over me �NO MENUS!! NO MENUS!! WHICH BUTTON IS THE VOLUME!!!??? THAT�S ALL I WANT!!�

Well what can you do? I showed him the button that would do it and tried to emphasize that I thought it would only do that function WHILE he was talking or he could get some loudness by placing it in speaker phone function otherwise he could be anywhere in a menu.

He acted like I was withholding information from him and pushed my hand away as I was pointing to the button that would, if he was in the act of talking, increase the volume, saying, �Get you hand out of my way.� Like I was offending him by pointing it out and leaving my finger there, as a guide, until he found it on his own (he�s almost totally blind).

Anyways poor Fred had to listen to this stupid crap all the way home. I was so mad. Don�t get me wrong. My Dad is not the devil (yet!) and he�s very generous with us financially and I know he loves each and everyone of us and he�s very proud of who and what each of us has become and he�s ALWAYS helped me when I needed it but sometimes he just makes me spitting MAD!!! And I guess this is one of those times but really am I wrong? How do you feel when someone hands your gift back to you? Critiques it? Or insists that it be altered or exchanged? Or deprives you of sharing the joy of the gift by not even opening it?

Just writing it down gets me all worked up!

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