Capricious: changing often and quickly; especially : often changing suddenly in mood or behavior.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/capricious
Used In “The Shawl”in the eleventh paragraph at the bottom.
We survived off him as if he were a capricious and dangerous line of work. I suppose we stopped thinking of him as a human being, certainly as a father.
I thought this to mean that his mood was always changing in volatile ways.
