The Red and the White - a One-Act

Scene: Ken and Joan, retired couple at breakfast in their home with Will, Ken’s son, and Lynn, Will’s wife, both visiting. All are at the table.

Joan: I see you've found the worst possible napkins that we have Ken.

Ken: They were the only napkins I could see where we keep our napkins. And, of course, you think they're not good even though they are perfectly good napkins.

Joan: They are NOT perfectly good napkins Ken. It takes three of them to clean up what one good napkin can easily take care of. You didn't see the bigger paper napkins?

Ken: I've only used one napkin and it seems to work fine.

Joan: You have not, Ken, you've used two.

Ken: One, two. . . what difference does it make.? They're cheap and effective.

Lynn: It's a waste of paper when we have nice cloth napkins.

[pause]

Joan: [to Ken] And you need to wipe your mouth . . . [to herself] which will probably require another napkin.

Ken: I can use this one. [picks up a use napkin] See? [wipes his mouth, but misses the food]

Joan: Fine, Ken. [rolls her eyes. gets up]

Will: I have to say that I've used two which, given their size, is probably equal to --

Ken: And if we’re going to talk about getting the wrong thing then where did this white wine come from?

Joan: I think Will picked it out Ken. It was in the refrigerator.

Ken: I know Will picked it out, but who bought it? You’re supposed to buy the red wines and I’m supposed to buy the white wines. I didn’t buy this white wine.

Joan: Sometimes I like a white wine that isn’t so sweet so I bought this one and Will chose it for dinner. Would you like one of your white wines?

Ken: Well, I don’t want any of this wine . . . or the red wine, so, yes, I would like one of the white wines that I bought. Two wines on the table and you know that I don’t like either one of them.

Joan: Well, your wine is in the refrigerator, Ken. Do you want me to get it for you?

Ken: Yes, Joan, that would be very nice . . . and while you’re up you can get the napkins you prefer if that’s what you want. I couldn’t find them. It was just these paper ones.

My Life

Today is my father's 81st birthday and while I believe unhappiness has dragged at him for the better part of his adult life, despite a few triumphs of sorts, it's only this week that he's admitted to being unhappy. And scared. Jean, his partner off and on for 30 years, was diagnosed with lung cancer this past Monday. At some time today or tomorrow, she finds out if it's been invasive and, if so, how much. She's 68, and strong, and since her mother's looking at 100, we all just assumed Jean would take care of and outlive my dad. I know he's assumed it, too. But now she may pass before he does and my poor dad who's never had any practice or inclination at expressing his own turmoils doesn't know, really doesn't know what to say or how to say it if he knew.

But he's got to be scared. A cloud of confusion has been slowly settling on my father in the last year it seems. It's just another thing he won't speak to because it doesn't cloud his thinking all the time and he can take care of himself well. But that cloud is surely there. He couldn't, for example, understand the Father's Day card from my brother, Scott. On the cover of the card was a comic rendition of a golfer, but my dad kept saying to Jean, "That isn't Scott!"

He fakes comprehension with me sometimes by just saying, "Yeah" in a monotone to just about whatever I say or ask.

He just passed his driver's test. He has no friends, nothing to occupy him with other people. And though he plays golf most days, he always insists upon playing alone. He says, in front of Jean sometimes, that he misses my mother who died in 1985, about eight years after my dad left her. "We'd've gotten back together again if she'd lived," he says. He left her because he was bored. Boredom with her, he must figure, would not be as troubling as the constant tension and contentiousness with Jean.

But now Jean could die in months. And my dad would be left alone 3 hours from us.

My life could get more complicated quite soon. And that's as it should be, I suppose. I wonder, perhaps a bit selfishly, how my, how our freedom, Tina's and mine, will be inhibited by my dad's loneliness and needs. How will it effect our happiness? Because Tina and I are happy. We've been happy for a good 28 years or more. That's the care and gift I wish I could've given my dad: happiness. But it has eluded him.


Photo by tonyvel

Dad's Batmobile

My father recently sold his Cadillac Eldorado. Spotless, that car, but what I most remember about it is some uncharacteristically sporty wheels. I first saw it nine years ago when he pulled into the parking lot of Francesco's restaurant near the Oakland Coliseum where we were about to see a Warrior's game. Here's what I thought at the time:

My father has always wanted a Cadillac and now, in his retirement, he has bought one and it's beautiful, if you like Cadillacs anyway. It's a dark, metallic blue with a black leather interior and the dashboard looks like something from a Star Wars cruiser. . . . but it has these really fancy wheels, wheels that look like the wheels on the Batmobile, really sporty chrome jobs that look like three big curving waves coming from the hub to the edges and that really don't seem to fit my 72 year old dad. In fact, even though my dad had told me to look for a dark blue Cadillac Eldorado, I didn't think this particular Eldorado was him because of the intensely sportorific wheels. So when he got out of the car all I could say was, "Nice ride, Dad, but what's up with the Batmobile wheels?"

He gave me "the look" (!!!!!) which he uses when he wants me to understand that he is not amused. The look looks like this: He closes his eyelids just a little while looking straight at me as if his eyes were big, black guns, and he takes a short breath and expels it forcefully while moving his tongue back and forth along and behind his bottom teeth.

"Car came with 'em, " he said. "I didn't choose 'em. They were just there. C'mon, we'll go for a ride. You drive."

So now I figure I better say something nice about the car so I put on my cheeriest smile and I say: "Wow, this is my first time in a Cadillac and it's just as comfortable as they say it would be." I had been in Cadillacs before, but I knew he'd be proud.

"Yeah, well not too many people get the opportunity to drive a Caddy" he says. Then he motioned to my left hand side by the door. "You see those controls at the edge of seat? You have 4 different settings there to make the seat exactly the way you like it."

"Really?" I enthused. So at that moment I started fooling with the controls to make the seat "exactly the way" I like it, but he says, "Hey, what're you doing there? I got it exactly the way I . . . hey, don't touch the button in front! You didn't touch the front button, did you?"

I told him I didn't know if I had touched the front button because I wasn't looking down at the buttons while I was driving, I was "just fooling around" with the buttons to make the seat more comfortable.

"I thought you said it was comfortable!" he says.

"Well, it was, but you said I could make it more comfortable," says I.

"What, by 'fooling around' with it?" he asks. And he gives me "the look" (!!!!!!).

"I wasn't really fooling around, I was 'experimenting,' trying to find the right fit."

"What do you need with the 'right fit?'" he asks. "We're just taking a little spin. I had the seat just the way I like it. If you didn't touch the front button then when I drive again I can push it and the seat will go back to the way I like it, but if you DID push the front button, then the seat will go back to some way that you had it after fooling around with it. Now I'm gonna have to readjust it again."

"Sorry," I offered. "Maybe I didn't touch the front button."

"Do you KNOW you didn't touch the front button?" he asked.

"No, I guess not."

"You just touched all the buttons you felt down there, right?"

"I suppose so," I admit.

"Well, you probably touched the front button. Hey, where are we anyway?"

At this point I was driving in downtown Oakland right around Jack London Square so my dad asked, "Do you know how to get back to the restaurant from here?" I said I did. Then he pushed a button on the dashboard and a computerized voice suddenly boomed in the car with "DESTINATION PLEASE."

My father then yelled, "FRANCESCO'S RESTAURANT, OAKLAND,CALIFORNIA, ON HEGENBERGER AVENUE!!!!"

The computer then asked, "Street address please," but I said, "Dad, I know how to get there," and the computer repeated, "Street address please," but Dad pressed the button again and the system stopped. "It's okay, Dad," I said. "I know how to get there."

"Eh, that' s not the point," he complained. "The navigation system can tell you the BEST way to get there."

"I know the best way," I said. "It's probably the only way."

"Oh yeah?," he said. He pressed the button again and again came the computer voice: "DESTINATION PLEASE."

Very quietly, Dad said to me, "give it your home address."

I whispered back, "I know how to get home, dad."

"Just give it . . . . "

"DESTINATION PLEASE."

"Just give it" . . . ( "the look." (!!!!!!!!!!) ) . . . "your address."

"Okay," I whispered and then more loudly I said, "Sixty-nine, twelve Balsam Way, Oakland."

There was a pause and then the computer said, "PLEASE REPEAT DESTINATION."

Before I could answer, my father screamed, "SIX NINE ONE TWO BALSAM WAY, OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA!" Then he whispered to me, "You gotta speak up and I don't think it understands 'sixty-nine twelve' anyway."

Then the computer said, in a more moderate tone, "take the second right from present location at Martin Luther King, Jr., Drive."

My father then asked for "FULL DIRECTIONS!" and the computer gave me directions that would surely have gotten me home, but they weren't what I would consider the best directions, so I said, "Well, that's not the way I'd go home from here."

"Why not," asked Dad.

"It's not the best way," I said.

"It's the best way according to the navigational system," he said.

"It'll get me home," I conceded, "but it's not the best way."

"Oh, so you know the BEST way," my dad says.

"I should know the best way to my own home. I've been living here ten years," I say and suddenly, suddenly!!!!! I realize that -- even though I've turned and looked away from my father -- I'm giving him "the look" (!!!!!!!!!!) I've inherited THE LOOK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Well, let's go eat," he says.

"Okay," I say.

Silence for minute.

"Handles nicely," I say.

"Yeah, she's smooth," he says.

"Must be the batwheels," I say.

"Yeah, right," he says. "The batwheels."