Powerless

 It happens every day. Some days shortly after 7:00 in the morning. It occasionally lasts until sometime around 8:00 in the evening. It doesn’t matter what I say or don’t say. It doesn’t matter if I answer or ignore. I know as sure as the sun will rise again tomorrow morning it will happen again tomorrow. Someone will call telling me that my extended warranty is about to expire. If it isn’t that call it is this one. Someone claiming to be from a medical provider wants to know if I have received my package from Medicare. It has the brace I must need for the pain in my knees and back. Sadly for them I have no knee or back pain so I do not want the items they insist I must need. They feign surprise at the notion that someone of my advanced age is not in pain and need of their medical devices. It doesn’t matter how many times I say no. It doesn’t matter how often I ask them to stop calling me. Nothing I say or do matters. Block the calls? They come from different numbers and cities evert time. Moline, Peoria, Fairview, Carlock, Rock Island, Baylis, Cantrall, Stanford, Farmington, Blandinsville all in Illinois. You can add on Lanai City, Hawaii; Logansport, Indiana; Phoenix, Arizona; Sharon Grove, Kentucky to the list of calls. I do my best to be patient and polite. After all it is just some guy or gal sitting in a call center somewhere on the planet trying to provide for his or her family. Being rude, cursing at them and a few other things that have crossed my mind will not stop the calls. So sometime again this morning my phone will ring. It will be my third call today. No Nigerian prince calling about my inheritance or lottery winnings. No one from Social Security or the IRS claiming fraudulent activity and demanding repayment with gift cards. No one claiming my computer has been hacked and wanting me to give them remote access to remove the virus. No one from Amazon claiming a new iPhone has been charged to my account. Just car warranty and medical device calls. Is this what old age and retirement have become? I do feel those calls have one vitally important purpose. When I get to hell (I am going there) it won’t seem so bad. Fire and brimstone? Who gives a shit? At least the damn phone isn’t ringing.