You may be wondering why I wrote so much today, a Saturday, when I'm often out and about with Jimmy. He spent most of the afternoon with his father who's in hospital, and he didn't sleep well last night, so has gone off early to bed. After he had been to the hospital he went and had a few too many in the pub and turned up drunk.
Usually when that happens - much less frequently - I get really angry, because I'm on edge, convinced he's spoiling for a fight. It was different today; I know why he got drunk, and I was annoyed at myself for being impatient, intolerant and non-understanding.
He believes his father is dying. He barely eats anything, is as thin as a bone, and lacking in any kind of energy. Jimmy had to spend an hour persuading him to watch the Celtic match the other night. Although he says he's looking a lot better from being overnight in hospital.
I don't know what to do or say. I have to be blunt - I don't like his father. I'm not alone in thinking that he's self-centred, self-serving and manipulative. I have it on good authority that he's always been like that, it's not merely a product of old age.
And he is old - 84. Jimmy is upset that his father is so frail. I can't feel any emotion. I guess I just have to look after Jimmy. And try and make sure he doesn't try drowning his sorrows in whiskey.
We sat up for a while together watching 100 Years, 100 Passions. He was saying how dated some of the old films seem now - although he displayed an encyclopaedic knowledge of certain films - he claims it was his mother who was the enthusiastic. I suggested that it depends: Casablanca is a classic, but Brief Encounter just looks stilted and irrelevant. Guess what, Brief Encounter is not on the list, but can one really argue with the top three:
Two of my favourites feature lower down: The Unbearable Lightness of Being, which I cannot remember seeing on terrestrial TV, and the Sound of Music. As one of the talking heads said - that scene in the Gazebo, where they sing "Something Good" -
For here you are standing there loving me, whether or not you should
So somewhere in my youth or childhood, I must have done something good
Nothing comes from nothing, nothing ever could
So somewhere in my youth or childhood, I must have done something good
- is one of the romantic, and whenever I see it I always full momentarily head-over-heels in crush on Christopher Plummer as Captain von Trapp.
And look how many memorable quotes there are from Casablanca:
- I'll hum it for you. Da-dy-da-dy-da-dum, da-dy-da-dee-da-dum...
- Here's looking at you, kid.
- Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.
- Kiss me. Kiss me as if it were the last time.
- I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
- We'll always have Paris.
- It doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.
- If you don't get in that plane you'll regret it. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon and for the rest of your life.
