Lost and found

I’ve lost my wits. Seriously. I’ve looked everywhere for them.

Case in point: my glasses — the ones I see out of. But before I get to that, I should start with my hearing.

Old-er people love to talk about their health. Count me in that number. And when I’m not talking to someone about my health issues or their health issues, then I’m reading about them, and not just my current issues but any issue that I don’t have right now but might get in the future.

Last week I was reading a story with a headline that was something like “People who need hearing aids but refuse to get them are 200 thousand percent more likely to get dementia.” Je suis that person. We can talk about hearing aids another time, but my takeaway from the article was how timely it came across my screen, based on my noticing recently that I’m having a harder time hearing the TV these days. My TV is in my sitting room, a tiny room that doubles as my tiny office (this is important later on).

So two nights later, I’m watching TV, and it’s really bugging me just how bad my hearing’s become. I stand up, undoubtedly in fury, and in doing so, I see the recently (as in, right around the same time my hearing took a turn for the worse) installed air purifier running full blast. In a DOH moment, I go “Are you kidding?” and turn it off. Magically, my hearing returns.

Then there’s my failing eyesight. Now, I spend most days glued to my computer. An astigmatism in one eye causes that eye to tire out by the end of the day and not see as well. It’s not a huge deal, but it’s there. And I’m aware of it. Lately, that awareness has led me to wonder if it’s getting worse — my vision, that is, not my awareness. I don’t dwell on it, but it’s there.

Then the other day, I’m looking at the computer screen and thinking my eyesight really is getting worse, in fact, way worse; everything’s turned blurry. Ah, I think, maybe I just need to clean the lenses. I hold my glasses in my hand and carefully wipe them clean, then put the glasses back on. Still blurry.

A half an hour later (a half hour of freaking out over my deteriorating eyesight), I stand up to get another cup of coffee, which requires me to take my “computer glasses” off and put my distance glasses on so I don’t trip on the stairs. DOH: What do I discover? I’ve been wearing my distance glasses the whole time. Of course, the first thing I do is install the computer glasses on my nose, et voila, I can see perfectly again.

How do I not notice for days that the air purifier is blasting away in my ear? How do I not notice I’m using the wrong glasses even when I am staring at them in my hand while I clean them?

I’m losing my wits. But I know just the thing: Start reading up on it.

Today, the Marshall Tucker Band …