The following post, in all honesty, is a rant.
TL DR -- I am annoyed at my father for quite blatantly ignoring covid regulations out of "fear and embarrassment", putting the rest of my family and neighbors at risk. I am unsure of how to imbue sense into him; I cannot meet him in person as I stay in San Francisco. He disregards my concerns as exaggerations and flags me as disrespectful (?!). Any input will be highly appreciated!
My father has been feeling under the weather for the past three days. He exhibits the classic symptoms of covid -- fever, cough, fatigue. He does not seem to have lost the senses of taste and smell, although I staunchly believe he may be lying about this to allay our fears that he may have contracted covid. I have been asking him to get tested for covid relentlessly for the past couple of days. My family lives in Kerala and my understanding is that healthcare workers will actually come home to administer the test. However, my father refuses to get tested because he believes its embarrassing to test positive (go figure!). He is concerned about neighbors knowing that he has contracted covid and the eventual judgement that they may pass. This is quite incomprehensible to me. Is there any social stigma against covid? What the heck?!
Another aspect that has been quite disconerting is his sheer disregard for my opinions. He disparages my advice, accusing me of blowing the situation out of proportion. He even chided me for being disrespectful to him, and basically called me a "kid". When will Indian parents start treating their children as god damn adults? They want us to act like adults when it comes to getting married and starting a family, but expect us to be "good little boys" who do not speak a single word in dissonance with them. I love my parents, I really do, but the level of hypocrisy is appalling.
Anyone have any ideas on how to get my father to at least get tested for covid? Can I call inform any authorities who can drop by our residence? I do not want to cause any legal troubles but at the same time, I do not want him to further spread the virus to others.
/end rant
obdurate
/ΛΙbdjΚrΙt/
adjective
stubbornly refusing to change one's opinion or course of action.
"I argued this point with him, but he was obdurate"
I just remembered about tgfβs old brand obdurate. What happened to it?
In the book's Afterword, Stephen King touched on his son's influence in his writing with regards to time travel. Given the fact that Joe is also a huge Doctor Who fan, I wonder if he was the source of "the past is obdurate" aka fixed points in time. I just finished the book a few minutes ago and this thought makes me happy.
