Did I Hear You Right?

DID I HEAR YOU RIGHT?

We went to our community pool yesterday during the late morning and I floated around with all the rest of the old guys, trying to have conversations with our hearing aids out. Had to laugh at the way some of the conversations went.

“The water feels great.”

“What’s that about grapes?”

“The weather is really turning hot.”

“You burned what pot?”

“Are you going to head north soon?”

“Who’s dead? So many people our age die.”

The thing is there were four of us floating around having this discussion and no one thought there was anything wrong. Each question received some answer and the next sentence would swing off that and so on.

Reminded me of that game we played years ago where someone would whisper a sentence in the next person’s ear and it would go around the room and the last person would say it out loud and it would be nothing like the first sentence and everyone would laugh. Except, now, we seem to get to the end of the game with the first pass.

My brother in law came over the other day with a new pair of those new hearing aids they advertise in the Desert Sun all the time. He gave up on his old pair. Said they squeaked all the time.

He said, “Wow, I just love these new aids. I can hear so good now and no background noises. I can hear everything now so plain.”

I said, Wow back. “I could sure use a set like that. What kind is it?”

He looked at his watch and said, “It’s three o’clock.”

I know I have problems hearing but didn’t realize that my wife was going deaf until the other day. I was in my study and could hear her in the kitchen. I yelled in, “what’s for Dinner?’ No answer.

I walked to the hallway door and yelled it again. Still no answer. Man, she has a real hearing problem. I finally walked into the kitchen and asked her again. She shook her head and said, “Ned, for the third time, I said we are having spaghetti.”

I try to get in the pool every day. My right knee is shot and it helps the pain. I am going to get knee replacement surgery on May 4th. The doctor says the new knee will last for twenty five years. I asked him if I should will it to somebody. I figured if I live that long, I’ll be duct taped to a chair with a drool towel, in some nursing home hallway and won’t need the knee any more.

My 20 year old hearing aids look almost brand new. I keep them in a box in a drawer in my bathroom. I figure I don’t need them as much as I used to. I really don’t need to know too much more than I used to know before my hearing went. Even when I do hear my wife telling me something I really need to know, I forget it before I need it anyway. I do have a little notebook she gave me to write things down but I keep losing it.

I am hoping I remember that her birthday is this Monday. Maybe one of you can remind me. I still have last year’s card I forgot to give her so I’m Ok there.

That’s ok with me if I don’t hear as good as I used to or that I can’t remember as much as I once did. I just read a book today that I read a month ago and couldn’t remember that I had read it. My wife told me she didn’t want to spoil my fun but that I had read it twice before. How does she know those things?

I think it’s all working out just fine, as far as I am concerned. I have about 6 or7 authors I like. At least that’s what I have in my bookcase. It saves buying new books.

I have over 100 Louis L'Amour books, but that’s another story. I bought them on eBay and I had to hide them in the garage and slowly sneak them into the house

I figure they should outlast my new knee.