I'm getting old. It happens. Hell, who doesn't? And if they don't, the option is worse. Still, some of the things related to aging really don't make the process quite so enticing. Things like being unable to loose weight quite so easily, hair growing out of places like your nose and ears but no longer your head, back pains, failing memory spans and lots of other stuff that escapes me at the moment. But hearing has become a recurring struggle. I actually went and got my hearing tested recently and I was quite surprised to be told it was normal.
Normal, that is, for somebody my age.
What's become a recurring issue has been an apparent loss of being about to 'filter out' background noises. Not only in crowded places but at home, when something's being said while my heads half buried in the freezer as I scoop out some ice, or if I'm rattling a grocery bag while the garage door is closing. These all seem like situations that I once had the ability to selectively tune out, while honing in on the words being spoken. Not anymore. Now, it's all just a jumble of equally pitched and volumed overlap, and more often then not, I have to crank my head and mutter "Eh? What's that you're sayin', Sonny? Speak up, yah wipper-snapper."
It was actually at my wife's insistence that I get my hearing checked. She's reached that point where loving concern has given way to irritated annoyance. I don't blame her one bit. But it does seem to happen more at home then anywhere else. I think a part of it has to do with her own muttering, and I'm sure she'd say it's probably my own subconscious tuning-out of her voice. Whatever the case, If I have to ask her to repeat herself too many more times I think my next anniversary present will be a hearing aid.
Oh, and speaking of hearing, have you heard about "Mosquito Ringtones?" It seems that ringtones are available that only specific age ranges can hear. You can test it on their website and it seems to work. The bottom line is that kids 18 or younger can have ringtones that their parents can't hear, enabling them to covertly leave the room to take a call without the parents even knowing that their phone is ringing in the first place. I have to give them a nod for having thought of such a sly little workaround.
