Tuesday, June 2, 2015

On Deafness (the Blue Period)

Tuesday morning, prominent local eye clinic. Bleach-blonde receptionists and bureaucrats with tasteful pieces of flair, eyelash extensions and dramatic eyebrows click-clack through the hallways. I've been sitting in a waiting room for over an hour with my aged relative, who is not only a little sight challenged at the moment, but also a little bit (a lot) deaf. For some reason, this clinic plays nature films on smallish ceiling-mounted TVs, the volume turned down low, in a kind of blissful refutation of the challenges faces by at least 80% of the clientele.

Ask me anything about flying squirrels.

Click-clack, goes the buxom blonde in the close-fitting black suit. Click-clack across the waiting room floor. And then back.

Zoom! Flying squirrels!

Click-clack.

Scuttle, go the Galapagos lizards.

Whomp, go the birds that cannot land.

Click-clack. There goes the blonde again.

Click-clack, again, but this time from the beaks of beautifully odd birds with blue feet.

You see where this is going, don't you? You do.

I didn't.

Which is why, as the robust blond in the close-fitting black suit click-clacked past me and my father, I found myself shouting to the lovely deaf man: BOOBIES! THEY'RE BOOBIES!