Thinking Out Loud

Thinking Out Loud

I recently told you what a terrific neighborhood I live in.  I began thinking about other things in my life that make my life better.  There are a lot of them, so I’ll try to keep it to some basics like inventions.

An invention is something that no one thought about before and now it exists.  Like shoe strings.   Or equal to that – aglets.  That’s a tag or metal sheath on the end of a lace, a cord, or ribbon to facilitate its passing through an eyelet.  (Definition: American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 1982 edition)  Thus, on to more inventions.

About 1966, I saw “The Glass Bottom Boat;’ the movie with Doris Day and Rod Taylor.  It was funny, but for me the most interesting part was the “magic oven” that cooked food in the miraculously quick time.  My first “radar range” (that we now call, microwave) came into my life in about 1980.  I had wanted one since seeing the one in the movie ten years earlier.  In Tucson for an education seminar, I saw one advertised costing about half the price of the same unit in my city.  I bought the microwave, there, and brought it home as a second piece of luggage in the airplane.  That first microwave lasted until this past summer.  It seems to me that forty-five years is a long time for such a unit  to last.  And, when I went with my handyman to get a new one from the store, we found a new Sharp Carousel, almost exactly like the old, disabled one.  Many new microwaves have controls that it takes an engineer to make work.  My new microwave is as large as the old one and fits comfortably in the microwave garage that Larry built for the original microwave.  And, I can use the controls in the same fashion as my old one.  A microwave is very important to me.  I cook using the microwave.  I do know friends and relatives who use this kitchen tool for warming up food – only.  When I bought my first microwave, I determined that I would learn to cook using it.  So, I did.

Think about life without a tape dispenser.  You would need to find the end of the tape (stuck to the tape).  You pull out the tape, keep it from re-sticking to the roll of tape, either tear it off or use scissors.  Then, arrange the end of the tape so that it will be easier to use, next time.  How much simpler it is when the tape is ensconced in a dispenser that includes a serrated edge for separating the tape you want from the tape you don’t.

When was the last time you sharpened a pencil with a pen knife?  My dad taught me how to put a very fine point on a pencil.  But, a pencil sharpener makes it a lot easier!  And, of course, we now have electric sharpeners.

When I was still living at home as a high school student and after I married in college, I did, of course, need to change the bed linens on a regular basis.  Those linens were top and bottom sheets, plus pillow cases, blankets, etc.  The problem always was the bottom sheet.  They were duplicates of the top sheets.  Flat.  No corners.  Hard to keep in place.  There is a special place in Heaven for the person who invented the corners on the bottom sheet!

There must also be special places for the creator of the CPAP machines.  They literally save lives.  I remember being at Ghost Ranch in New Mexico; I was there for an art class, and a friend was there with me, sharing the room.  During the night, I apparently snore like a freight train, and the next morning, my friend and I were discussing the snoring and the fact that during the preceding night, I had stopped breathing.  My friend heard this and was concerned.  She had shoved me to get me to wake up and breathe.  She said when I did wake up, I took a breath that was incredibly deep and loud.  We were laughing about this whole situation when the host of the Elderhostel we were attending told us that it is not a laughing matter.  That the preceding winter a man lost his life to undiagnosed sleep apnea.  When I got home from that workshop, I had my first sleep study, and my first CPAP machine was delivered.

And, what about safety pins?  And, fences – in my town and area, we have fences.  But, I know areas of the U.S. where fences are non-existent.  How are pets and children to stay safe in those areas?  And  computers and calculators?  What about scissors?  How do you cut paper and cloth not using scissors?

Include in this list, my Tahoe (four-wheel drive mechanism, just like my Suburban had).  I’m about to find out if a vision-care specialist (new to me) will have some new invention to benefit me and to assist me with the macular degeneration problem that plagues me.

Here are a few things to think about.

During their lives, many of our parents lived with so many things that arrived in their lives for the first time in their home, their town, their state, their country, their world, their universe, etc.  From chopping wood and using it for heating and cooking (and carrying out the ashes) to gas and electric stoves, and the afore mentioned microwaves.  Gas powered furnaces and water heaters.  From horses to gasoline powered automobiles.  And,now electric.

From wishing for flights of airplanes to knowing that humans have walked on the moon.  From men-only universities to coed studies. From all-men U.S. presidents and vice to a woman vice president.  From clothes washing in a stream or tin tubs with hand crank rolling wringers and hanging clothes on a line where they freeze in winter to electric or gas powered washers and dryers.  Planting and harvesting the food that is eaten to canned and boxed prepared foods.

I could go on and on and on and on …, but I won’t.  I do encourage you to think about those things that benefit you and the inventors of such things.

Be safe and Be well.

The Cranky Crone

Thoughtful comments are appreciated.