I've kept an ongoing work log documenting all my daily activities from 07/18/23 to the current day. I've done this rigorously, and it's generally added daily to a single Google Docs file that I will continue to maintain.
That said, beginning today, I am going to focus on documenting each day's work and general activities here on this blog, with each day published in its own dedicated post.
This "work log," as I call it covers my basic contractual work that is related to daily book keeping/accounting work for Harris Tire Co. (owned by father, James Harris) as well as any other daily work, events or moments that I think worth noting and which might equal value if ever revued by myself or a third party at some point in the future.
There is a lot more that I see to than the verbally agreed-upon contractual work I do for $600 per week, specifically, QuickBooks work for Harris Tire Company. I'm daily responsible for quite extensive levels of technical work, research, and study that are never discussed as contractual obligations and for which I'm never paid.
The lack of any compensation for the huge amount of other work I do is not a problem for me at all. That is not where I'm headed with this...
In point of fact, I've very much enjoyed doing this work for my father. It's something new to learn; it's data, and I enjoy organizing data. Many of the topics I've had to take on and the problems I've had to solve involve complex, unknown subjects, such as managing a seven-figure investment portfolio for the past three years or researching just what in the hell a revocable trust is or why/how a business owner must file rendition forms with the state work.
The mentioned investment work includes the past personal investigation of my father's former, highly corrupt (documented at SEC.GOV) advisor of 15 years, whom I quickly discovered had been "churning" the hell out of my Dad's money and whom I quickly coaxed into "firing himself" by publicly exposing his activities. Essentially, once called out, the guy LITERALLY phoned my father the next day and withdrew from any dealings with him. Long story short, the fellow who had been doing "investment work" for my father had multiple infractions cited at SEC and FINRA that involved reported "churning" when he was employed with a previous and notable firm here in Houston (from which he was fired for his activities).
Other significant and taxing work over the years has been work related to the transition of a 60-year-old brick-and-mortar incorporated business to an entirely new, home-based operation: vendors, customers, software licenses, phone systems, mailing addresses, home network installation, configuring of all home workstation computers, county toll road authorizations, banking information, ... the list could go on and on. But it was and remains a great deal of work WAY outside the bounds of any understood contractual and paid arrangement I have with Harris Tire Company or my father.
But again, I don't mind. It's been fun, although at a point, due to the work being so consuming, I had to set some expressly defined and discussed boundaries as to where my limits would be moving forward and in regards, primarily, to the investment work since that was the most time consuming and research intensive (including lots of legal stuff as well).
THAT SAID!
As repeated here, I continue to deal with a couple of vexing but acute problems in my current living arrangement, where I share a legacy home with only my father and me.
PROBLEM ONE: My father has self-generated, made up, created out of thin air, however it could be described... a deeply embedded and genuine belief in the notion that I've been professionally diagnosed as having PARANOID SCHIZOPHRENIA for over twenty years now.
He not only believes this to his core, but for the same two decades or more, he's shared that same claim as fact with EVERY SINGLE ONE of my existing family members and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF HIS personal friends.
This has caused untold damage to my person over the years, as one might suspect. From mental health welfare calls being phoned in to the local sheriff's department from other family members, and in regards to myself (due to their believing the mental illness/diagnosis myth) to my father's habit of knee-jerk questioning anything he might observer that appears "off" or "out of the norm," such as something so simple as mis pronouncing another person's name which, for him, immediately becomes a sign of something amiss.
But the main reason I keep the work log...
Is because WE LIVE IN A COMPLETE VOID. This, compounded by the fact that my father wears two distinct faces according to where he happens to be at any given time. In private, James Harris is a completely different person from the James Harris presented to the public. This is so acute that I'm inclined to call it "lycanthropic" or ... a jekyl/hyde type of transformation that occurs. More on that later...
Health and Human Resources
Fortunately, when first taking on all of the company business and just about all of my father's personal affairss (all of it, taxes, investing, insurance accounts, medical documentation, home repair, airport parking arrangment, flight information, EVERYTHING) ... when taking on all of that, already knowing my father's mental state was being compounded by the natural degradation that comes with age, I immediatley contacted representatives with Texas Health and Human Resources for guidance.
I had no idea how to handle a highly temperamental, rage-prone individual in his 80's and who was definitely showing the signs of aging that I think will afflict all of us in time: quick to temper, lack of emotional stability, fear of being alone, etc. Lacking any immediate friends in the field of elderly care, and especially in a situation where I had become a full-time caretaker of this individual's entire personal affairs, the only thing I knew to do was reach out to various "hotlines" and elderly care authorities associated with the state of Texas.
DOCUMENT EVERYTHING!!
"Document EVERYTHING" was the very first and most frequently repeated piece of advice that state professionals recommended. They took it so far as to explicitly recommend that I record audio on a daily basis, that I record video if able to do so, and also spent a good deal of time with me explaining the legal nuances of taking part in such documentation, all of which I absorbed like a sponge and was grateful for.
So, following the guidance of these folks with the state of Texas, I did as they recommended and first had a formal sit-down with my father, explaining the discussions I'd been having and confirming his verbal agreement that he would not mind my recording audio every day.
He also clearly agreed that any video documentation within the bounds of the law would be fine with him.
So for the past two years, I've carried a small, high-capacity audio recorder in my pocket every single day that captures every moment that passes. I turn the recorder off in the obviously inappropriate times such as doctor visits, etc. but otherwise, the little thing is going all the time.
The recordings are segmented by 30 minute breaks. I've saved several over the years which I think are most indicative of the problems I address PRIVATELY here in this void that I live in with my aging father and which I'll likely begin publishing here.
The recordings, for the most part, have been most beneficial however for listening to my own voice in any given exchange throughout the day and observing, some times with a cringe, how badly I MYSELF need to make changes and improve my conversational approach when dealing with a "hair-trigger" temper type person and as well, when just being mindful of the other person's natural shortcomings as such relate to age and diminishing faculties.
I mean, it's like a gold mine of personal improvement data and I can plainly admit, that I've duely noted MANY cases where any given exchange might have been made less problematic if I'd have simply changed a few words or even a tone of voice.
So the audio recordings are highly valuable as both an instructional tool for myself and a publicly demonstrable set of data wherein I can clearly point out to third parties if ever necessary the particularly difficult emotional states that my father will fly off into on just the most random and/or benign of engagements (verbally).
But to the work I go...
But the point of this tract is to mention that I'll be keeping my daily work log here as well as in the single, historically updated Google doc file.
More later...
