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aLL grown up — The wageS oF The goLden yearS foUr SEaSonS SPotLiGHt 6 FOUR SEASONS BREEZE | JANUARY 2016 When I'm using something, I try not to put it down. That's because in my Golden Years, if I don't have it in hand, I forget where it is. Which, of course, causes an overload problem: If I'm holding a hammer, the Gorilla Glue and a screwdriver, how can I pick up the pliers? The other day I found myself standing in front of the kitchen oven — pre-heating to 375° — with a crossword puzzle book and a wood chisel in one hand and my car keys in the other. Apparently I was multitasking, but these days, do more than one thing at a time and confusion reigns. I finally realized I was supposed to put a casserole in the oven (my wife had left a note on the counter) but I never did sort out the other tasks, so I put everything away — and now I can't find the wood chisel. And it's not just tools. I use my front shirt pocket as a catchall because it's sewn to the shirt and I can't lose it. My shirt bulges like Jane Mansfield's sweater. I carry my clip-on sunglasses, the grocery list I shopped from this morning, the hearing aid I just took out to answer the phone, and the receipts from every grocery, department and drug store I've been in for days and the Costco and credit cards I used. Try sorting through that to find the parking lot ticket needed to get off the lot. I've never been the best organized guy in town, but things have gone downhill from there. The desk in my den looks like the paper bin at the recycle center. But I'm afraid to move anything off because I'll never find it. It's hard enough to find in all that mess, anyway. Maybe I can come up with a receptacle to put things in so I can find them. It would have to have a lot of capacity and be really obvious so I can remember where it is. Of course that will generate a lot of clutter and my desk already serves much of that purpose — but the desk is too big to carry around. There must be a better solution. Resolution: Find out what it would cost to hire a personal attendant to keep track of my stuff — and remind me what it is I'm doing. I have learned to be particularly wary of Gorilla Glue. Get messy with that on your workbench and you can create an entanglement of hammerscrewpliers that defies unbinding. (Come to think of it, that might be a marketable super tool. I better look into that.) I have also learned that Gorilla Glue binds to my hands just as firmly as to whatever I'm holding or trying to mend. So for now, I put down the Gorilla Glue to avoid becoming a permanent Edward Pliershands, and muddle ahead with the tools that don't stick to each other. Then, when I need the glue — where did it go? Often I find it has dripped and permanently bonded to the workbench. As soon as I remedy that (with paint thinner and a scraper) I look for the cap to the tube to prevent further dripping and discover it too, with a merest trace of glue on it, is bonded to the bench. Because I have to put down the open tube to recover the cap, the potential of a new drip arises and — well, you can see this might go on for a long time. Resolution: Try duct tape first. Back when I was young and arrogant, if I saw an old guy struggle to get out of a low chair or his car, I would say, "I hope I never get that old." Now that I am that old, let me amend that. What I meant was, "I hope I never get that decrepit." Alas, even that is coming to pass. It takes the same amount of effort to get up from the living room couch that it used to take to lug hods, bricks and scaffold parts around a construction site all day. I never thought I'd be out of breath after buttering my bread or find it an athletic feat to pick up my car keys if I drop them. Maybe that should be added to the Senior Olympics as an event — the Key Ring Pickup, with fastest time winning, but with deductions for excess grunting or falling to one knee. Both knees would mean disqualification. Resolution: Be respectful of my elders — which gets easier as they thin out. I used to never forget a face or the name that went with it. Today, only people I met before the turn of the century and my immediate family reside in my memory. I'm sure a number of recent acquaintances think I'm some kind of a snob because I have walked past as though I'm too good for them. It's not that; they're better than me because they can remember and I can't. Complicating the problem is what is politely called a "hearing deficit." That means I'm as deaf as a post in one ear and only marginally better in the other, which often means I don't hear when someone says hello or calls my name. If I could hear them, I could at least fake remembering them — you know, the big, phony smile and, "How are you? You're surely looking good," all the while wracking my brain for their names. A further contributor to this problem is that as we enter the Golden Years we start looking a lot alike. A while ago I went to a high school reunion and walked into the opening reception only to see a whole bunch of similar-looking, gray-haired, mildly overweight old strangers I didn't recognize. Athletic postures had slumped, six-pack abs had expanded to beer kegs, sharply-chiseled features had weathered and lost definition. Everybody was rounder and softer — and grayer. There were some synthetic exceptions to the grayness, but they were no help in identification. Only with the use of name tags (in senior-citizen-readable, big type) that included high school graduation photos, was I able to discover I knew almost all of these soft, round, gray Golden Agers. With that kind of trouble with faces I have known for all those years, think of the problems caused by new ones. Resolution: Apologize to everyone I've met since 1997 for acting like a snob. Resolved: Keep Track, Duct Tape It, Show Respect, Apologize By Crotchet E. Oldman

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