The Old Man & The Scene

This is a story about an old man 's introduction to the internet and it's consequences... Part of the forthcoming 'Dad's Adventures in Cyberspace' series...

indent]I pulled up outside the little Suffolk cottage and tapped the steering wheel thoughtfully with my fingers. The place looked the same, the little garden immaculate, the fragrant Diamond Days Forever roses lovingly pruned and the fuchsia bush carefully tied back off the path. It just hadn�t felt the same after Mum had died. It had been a long year; a year of Dad �pottering� in the garden and a year of him �rattling around� inside the cottage, as he liked to put it. A year of Dad saying �Oh, I�m almost terrific,� when people asked how he was.
     The tidy gravel path crunched satisfyingly underfoot as I approached and rang the door bell. I could see his unwieldy form lumbering up the hallway through the frosted glass of the front door. I could see a magazine glued to his hand and knew that, without a doubt, it would be the TV Times.
     �Hello sunshine,� Dad�s weathered features cracked into a smile and he batted me about the side of the head with a copy of the TV Times.
     �How are you Dad?�
     �Oh, I�m almost terrific.�
     As we shared a pot of tea, I stared down at the magazine and noted that it was three months old. �So what have you been up to?�
     �Oh, keeping busy, watching telly, a little this and that, gardening, you know how it is.�
     �Have you been out of the house at all?�
     Dad smiled. �Of course I have, I�d starve otherwise.�
     �You know what I mean, asides shopping. Have you been down to the Community Hall at all?�
     Dad made a face, �I only used to go to please your Mother, besides�� he shrugged, �it�s not really been the same since��
     �You should really get out more, go into town, go to the pub, meet people.�
     Dad gave a shake of his head, �never really been one for the pub and it�s a fair old walk into town, what with my knees and all��
     That pretty much made my mind up. �Okay I�ve got something for you; wait there.�
     �Righty-ho!� Said Dad sipping tea and flicking through what was on TV three months ago.

     �Good heavens, what�s that?� Dad said as I deposited the boxes in the front room.
     �It�s my old PC, it all works and is the perfect gateway to the internet.�
     �What do I need a computer for?� Dad said eying the boxes with nothing short of abject technophobia.
     �You need to make the shift into the technological scene Dad; it�ll give you something to do. It�ll certainly save you looking at old editions of TV mags.�
     �Well�� Dad said dubiously. �I don�t know the first thing about computers; it�s all very Space 1999 if you ask me.�
     �Dad, it�s 2007 and if you can navigate through TeleText and set the video to record your programmes, you can work the internet.�
     �Isn�t it all full of weirdoes?� He said, scratching his nose and peering through his glasses. �And what if I set off atomic missiles or something?�
     �Dad, seriously, it�s fairly unlikely that you�ll single-handedly hack into a military installation with a 512MB Packard Bell �no matter what Matthew Broderick films have taught you.� He shrugged as if that may have been a genuine possibility. �Look, you like reading, right? You like encyclopaedias.�
     Dad nodded.
     �Well just think of the internet as the biggest encyclopaedia in the world, plus you can catch up on stuff from the TV, hobbies � your photography all that.�
     Dad sighed and muttered something about old dogs and new tricks.

     �There you go,� I said, �all sorted. You�re connected.� I gave him a brief introduction to the World Wide Web, links, searches and the like. We had a chuckle over people falling off things on You Tube and a few more cups of tea. We visited a couple of chatrooms though he didn�t seem overly enchanted.
     �So what�s the point in all these chatrooms?� He said dunking a biscuit and watching it break off and slop back into his tea, �bugger.�
     �Well it�s like a meeting place for people, like the Community Hall, but online and much bigger.�
     �Well I don�t know who they are? What if they�re terrorists?�
     �It says their name here,� I pointed out the box on the right of the screen, �that�s who they are.�
     �What �Demon Sephiroth�? Good heavens I hope not! And this one, �Yo Muthas Killa�!�
     �Okay, okay, we�re in a Heavy Metal chatroom, perhaps not where you want to be. They do have Country and Western chatrooms you know. Blimey, they used to have a �Quilt Making� chatroom on the old Yahoo!�
     Dad didn�t seem overly enthralled, so we moved on to shopping. This he was impressed with because it meant that he may not have to leave the house at all; I had the feeling that this plan was starting to backfire. I left him to it, stabbing hesitantly at keys and battling with the mouse.

Two weeks later, I received this:

Helo sunshine. i got email that should put that miserable sod of a postman out of a job! well im now truly part of the space age i feel like martin Landau ! just wanted to see if this reached your house. hope you and the lady are ok and she is keeping you in tow. let me know if you get this luv dad.
ps. there are a lotof nudey ladies on the computor and I didn�t want you to thinck that i had put them on here they just seemed to have appeared. dad.

     Well he was certainly making the effort to learn although I really wished I�d adjusted the parental controls. I chuckled as I imagined his face when confronted with �Asian Babes� or �Big Naturals� or something. It was funny until I thought about him coming across sites like �Meatholes�, �Wired P***y� or �Shiteaters.com�� good grief, the poor bloke could expire right in front of the monitor. I figured that it might be safer to pop by at the weekend and set the filters to block any filth the poor old boy may be exposed to.
     I swung by after work on the Friday and trotted up the garden path. I was surprised to find Dad wearing a shirt and tie when he answered the door. �Oh hello sunshine,� he said looking faintly taken aback, �I wasn�t expecting you.�
     We walked into the front room; the place looked tidy, very tidy in fact.
     �Uh right� you going out?�
     �No, no, I was� um� staying in actually.�
     �Right, well I was just going to have a look at your PC and sort some-� I stopped. �Why are you wearing a shirt and tie?� I knew I sounded suspicious although I hadn�t really meant to.
     �I have a� friend� coming over for dinner.�
     �Really? A chick?�
     �Yes, well you said I should go out and meet more people.�
     I grinned, �way to go Dad!�
     He looked relieved, �oh thank God, I wasn�t sure what you�d say after Mum and all��
     �God, no Dad, not at all. No, you should hang out with other people, you can�t stay indoors forever � Mum wouldn�t want that.� Dad fired me one of his �hmm, well I don�t know about that� looks and clasped my hand.
     �I�m glad you�re not upset sunshine.�
     �Course not. So where did you meet her? Community Hall?�
     Dad gave a light chuckle, �no, no on the old Space box over there. I met her in a chatroom; she only lives a few miles up the road.�
     I laughed and clapped him on the arm, �you sly old dog you! So what�s she like?�
     Dad chuckled again, �I have no idea, it�s sort of a blind date, she should be here any minute. In fact, you can meet her.�
     Oh�
     �We seem to have a lot in common anyway,� he said reaching over to light a candle on the table, �we�ve been chatting quite a bit and we appear to like all the same things.�
     �Oh right��
     �I saw her name straight away and knew we would get on like a house on fire.�
     �What do you mean?�
     �Well she loves her telly, like me.�
     �So� who is she?�
     �Sindy her name is,� Dad smiled proudly, �Sindy_UK_TV.�
     �Oh, Dad�I don�t think- look, TV doesn�t always stand for Television on the internet��
     The doorbell chimed suddenly.
     Oh f**k me.



Helloooo!

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Author's Note

Although this 'old man' pays more than a passing resemblence to my Dad, it is not him - moreover my Mum is not dead (she wanted me to point that out). Like I say, this may NOT be my Dad but it is certainly how he would react to such an alien concept as the internet... I dread to think.

Reviews

[Chantal-lise Mirman]

Hey, Howie! I loved this story - even though I had to google the punchline (since I live in the USA). Your characterization of your Dad as an affable yet opinionated somewhat compulsive widower seems very genuine. And I think it's a riot that your Mum is actually still alive! Did your Dad see himself in this story? You move the story along briskly and your use of dialogue is very natural. The e-mail was a perfect touch. A very nice little vignette, all in all.

[Nancy Lee Shrader]

Congrats on you great First Place Story

[.]

Same for my dad - first impression about chatrooms lol xD
This was very funny
I enjoyed this story
~Kavish~

[Marie]

Nice writing. Like I said, I love reading your work and need to do more of it.

[dawnsue541]

Good One!!! I am sending a copy of this to my Father he will crack up!

[Michael Carr]

great piece. needs some work on typos, would go through it again, mainly just punctuation, grammatical. still I really enjoyed it, very humorous and great ending.
well done again.

[An Ordinary Woman]

What a great story ! Yanno, my mom is more pc literate than I am sometimes. I just wish she would use it to meet a guy, that would make my day. lol

Too many fave lines to list, this was fab and the imagery was great !

you have a great way of setting up the scene and following through ~ as always a pleasure to read!

one small typo ...
... tapped the steering wheel thoughtfully with his (my) fingers.

[Narnie]

Haha.. you got some wry chuckles out of me having been through similar with my own mum. Oh and you chose the name Sindy... I so have to tell you about a situation I had with a girl called Sindy LOL!

As usual this is fabulous. I think we could hear more exploits from Dad and his despairing son? Fab stuff.

[Phill Oz O'fee]

The bewilderment, fascination and demise of the �silver surfer�, was great read. The line..

�Isn�t it all full of weirdoes?� He said, scratching his nose and peering through his glasses. �And what if I set off atomic missiles or something?�

.. got me going; I could identify this with a relative, just like the �Dad� character.

The punch line, Sindy_TV_UK, was inspired (although vaguely familiar - as think I saw this handle on a colleagues �friends site�).

An entertaining and light-hearted enjoyable read!

God�s Blessing
Phillozofee