Old
People
The following is supposed to be humorous, but it
describes behavior typical of people who cannot see what they are
doing. As your eyes age they loose the flexibility to adjust to near
and far distances. That is why it older people typically tend to
wear reading glasses or bifocals or trifocals or progressive glasses.
What often is diagnosed as senility or dementia or
ADHD may actually be the habitual acceptance of an older person's inability
of to see what they are doing because their prescription is not properly
refracted.
If the following sounds like YOU, you may
need to have your eyes checked first before you fall into the stereotype, or
worse, accept your frustration.
Recently, I was diagnosed with
A.A.A.D.D. -
Age Activated
Attention Deficit Disorder.
This is how it
manifests:
I decide to water my
garden.
As I turn on the hose
in the driveway,
I look over at my car
and decide it needs washing.
As I start toward the
garage,
I notice mail on the
porch table that
I brought up from the
mail box earlier.
I decide to go
through the mail before I wash the car.
I lay my car keys on
the table,
put the junk mail in
the garbage can under the table,
and notice that the
can is full.
So, I decide to put
the bills back
on the table and take
out the garbage first.
But then I think,
since I'm going to be
near the mailbox
when I take out the
garbage anyway,
I may as well pay the
bills first.
I take my check book
off the table,
and see that there is
only one check left.
My extra checks are
in my desk in the study,
so I go inside the
house to my desk where
I find the can of
Coke I'd been drinking.
I'm going to look for my checks,
but first I need to
push the Coke aside
so that I don't
accidentally knock it over.
The Coke is getting
warm,
and I decide to put
it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.
As I head toward the
kitchen with the Coke,
a vase of flowers on
the counter
catches my eye--they
need water.
I put the Coke on the
counter and
discover my reading
glasses that
I've been searching
for all morning.
I decide I better put
them back on my desk,
but first I'm going
to water the flowers.
I set the glasses
back down on the counter,
fill a container with
water and suddenly spot the TV remote.
Someone left it on
the kitchen table.
I realize that
tonight when we go to watch TV,
I'll be looking for
the remote,
but I won't remember
that it's on the kitchen table,
so I decide to put it back in the den where it
belongs,
but first I'll water
the flowers.
I pour some water in
the flowers,
but quite a bit of it
spills on the floor.
So, I set the remote
back on the table,
get some towels and
wipe up the spill.
Then, I head down the
hall trying to
remember what I was
planning to do.
At the end of the
day:
the car isn't washed
the bills aren't paid
there is a warm can
of Coke sitting on the counter
the flowers don't
have enough water,
there is still only 1
check in my check book,
I can't find the
remote,
I can't find my
glasses,
and I don't remember
what I did with the car keys.
Then, when I try to
figure out why nothing got done today,
I'm really baffled
because I know I was busy all day,
and I'm really tired.
I realize this is a
serious problem,
and I'll try to get
some help for it,
but first I'll check
my e-mail....
Tragically,
what really needs to be checked is the accuracy of the glasses of the person
trying to do the above activities.
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