Reach out and beep someone

Joe's telephone conversations with his mother are often punctuated by laughter. My phone conversations with my own parents are often punctuated by...other sounds. Reconstructed here is my most recent discussion with them, after my mother's return home from inpatient therapy.

I ask my mother if she is glad to be home.

"No," she says.

Well, this is off to a positive start.

"You mean Dad's not treating you like a queen and doing everything for you?" I ask.

My mother does not snort, but she comes dangerously close this time.

"He drops me off at the door to the grocery store," she says.

"That's helpful, " I say encouragingly.

"It would be more helpful if he came in with me."

Our conversation is periodically interrupted by a loud BEEP!, which we attempt to ignore for a while.

"What is that sound?" my mother finally asks.

"It sounds like someone is pushing the buttons on the phone," I say pointedly.

My father coughs. He explains, in a somewhat irritated tone, that he is trying to turn the volume down on the TV. He clearly would appreciate being left alone to handle this task.

My mother attempts to explain to him that one generally uses the remote to turn down the volume on the TV, and that he is not going to be successful by pushing the telephone buttons, no matter how many BEEPs! he makes.

But in her haste to be helpful, she calls the telephone the television, so that her advice comes out like this:

"You're using the television, Jim."

"Yes, I know I'm using the television," he says. "I'm trying to turn it down."

"But it's not going to work by pushing the television," she insists. "You have to use the, uh, other thing...."

"I am using the other thing," he insists.

The conversation proceeds in this manner for some time, punctuated by more BEEPs! I finally point out that what my mother is trying to recommend is the use of the remote.

"That's right!" she says. "The remote."

The BEEPs! subside, as does the noise coming from the television, and my mother and I continue our discussion.

But soon we hear water running. My mother sighs. "Now what are you doing?" she asks my father.

"I'm rinsing my dishes off, like I'm supposed to," he says somewhat peevishly. He has come under fire recently from more than one of his children for not helping my mother with the dishes, and here he is trying to be helpful, yet he gets reprimanded.

His dishes must have been very dirty, because the water continues to run for a while. My mother and I talk over the sound.

Things are quiet for a while, then we hear a bag rustling. My mother inquires yet again what my dad is doing.

"I'm having my snack," he explains. "There's nothing wrong with that, is there?"

"Do you have to do it while we're on the phone?" she asks.

He regards this as a frivolous question and continues to rustle in the bag. My mother attempts to pick up where we left off talking.

Gradually we become aware of munching sounds.

My mother sighs heavily. "Well, what can you do with him?" she says rhetorically to me.

"With who?" my father demands. Although he cannot hear much of what we are saying over his munching -- WE cannot hear much of what we are saying over his munching -- he hears enough to suspect, with that uncanny sense husbands and fathers everywhere possess, that we are discussing him. And if we are, he wants to know about it.

I begin to say my goodbyes. "Call back when it's not so noisy," my father says. "I could hardly hear a word you said."

There is one final sound. It is from my mother, and she is snorting.