You know you’re getting old when the language you’ve lived your life with – and made your living by – changes before your eyes and you know there’s not a thing you can do about it.
Take the word caregiver, for example, which has begun to make its way into everyday talk. People used to be parents, babysitters, guardians. Pretty soon, they’ll all be caregivers.
No more Mom and Dad. It’ll be primary caregiver, secondary caregiver, etc. All of which begs the questions: Are the recipients of a caregiver’s care to be known as caretakers? Will kids soon be overheard taunting, “My caregiver is bigger than your caregiver?” Or, “Your caregiver wears army boots?”
We’ve discovered a polite way to describe the unusual habits of strange people. Today, a man enjoys an alternative lifestyle. Years ago, he was a “nut.”
What’s the opposite of quality time? Inferior time? If your time is lacking in quality, what can be done to improve it?
All time ever does, and since time began it’s been doing it very well, is pass. It’s never gotten better or worse at it.
In my life, I’ve had good times and bad times. If a quality time comes along, I may not be able to handle it.
Factories I’ve worked in have quality-control inspectors. Will we some day see quality-time inspectors? How was my weekend? Well, I had a couple of quality hours Saturday afternoon but the evening time was definitely substandard.
Popular nowadays are job descriptions. This is mine: I come to work. I work. I go home from work. On the list of things included as falling within my area of responsibility: everything I haven’t been able to get out of and nobody else wants to do.
Brainstorm. People get together in a group and at some sort of signal, their brains all begin to, well, storm. Gales blow from their ears, rain pours from their mouths and lightning flashes in their eyes.
This is supposed to be a beneficial experience. I had a brainstorm once and I don’t want any more.
People used to talk to other people about ideas, projects or goals. Now they network. What I wonder is what happens to the network in the event of a brainstorm? Does it go off the air?
I don’t even want to discuss the words feedback, interface, consensus. Input bugs me. As a newspaper editor, I recently got a press release from an organization welcoming “ideas and input” and I wondered, what is the difference between the two?
Feedback sounds like what my cats give me when their stomachs are upset.
Witness how polite we’ve become. Today, a man is an underachiever. He used to be a lazy, good-for-nothing bum. Another man has a personality disorder. He used to be a dirty rat. A third man is cost conscious. He used to be a miser, skinflint, tightwad – you choose.
A boy is socially maladjusted. He used to be a brat. Another kid displays aggressive tendencies. At one time, he was a bully.
Today, news reports talk about the amount of disposable income a person has. Sounds rather callous. “Well, we got this $50 left over,” says Mom. “What say we burn it?”
Used to be, all your income was disposable. If you couldn’t figure out ways to get rid of it, lots of people were happy to help you do the job.
I don’t know any more. Dumps are landfill sites. Farmers are becoming agriculturalists. Teachers are educators. Reporters are “the media.” More than one money is monies.
Oh well. At least I don’t have to worry about getting old. I’ll undergo the aging process instead. Some day, a piece in the paper will describe me as being 80 years “young.”
And I’ll never die. Instead, the hospital will list my untimely expiration as just another negative patient outcome.
©1987 Jim Hagarty
