Thursday, April 1, 2010

Communication


What you hear and what is said is not always the same thing. I was reminded of this, this afternoon when I received a frantic phone call from my grandson.

He said, "Grandpa, can you help me change a tire?"

I said, "Sure, but you have to do all the work because I cannot lift anything or bend over due to my eye surgery."

He said, "Fine, I will be right over."

We live on a hillside, so when he arrived I told him to move his car down to the front of the house where it is level. He looked at me strangely, and said why to which I replied that we needed to have the car level in order to change the tire otherwise it might fall off the jack.

He continue to look at me strangely, at which point I noticed that he was holding a tie in his hand.

"To tie a tie?", he replied.

At which point I realized that he was talking about a tie and I was talking about a tire. Yes, he rushed over so I could help him tie his tie, not change his tire.

Attempting to recover some dignity, I looked at Mrs. Critter and said, "See, you are not the only one I don't understand".

6 comments:

  1. funny story! Jerry I have to think the whole problem with men is they just don't listen. My husband can be looking me straight in my face when I'm saying something to him but his brain doesn't compute, he is totally blocking me out. Wonder why men do that? Is it because we never shut up? Women speak thousands more words in a day compared to men.

    Or maybe your hearing is starting to go Jerry, better get that checked :-)))

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  2. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this story........ !! A gem !!!!

    So many men don't know how to tie a tie... lol.

    I know when my son graduated Kindergarten I got him a tie; and had to go around asking someone to tie it when we got to the school.. lol. (I should have gotten a clip on one.. had to keep asking because so many did not know how to do one either).

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  3. I tried to tie it standing in front of him, but I could not. Everything was backwards.

    I need to look in a mirror to tie a tie, so I stood behind him, looked in the mirror, and tied it as though it was on my neck.

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  4. Aww.. that makes sense.. good idea to go behind him.

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  5. A tie or a tire -- what's the difference, really.

    The important thing is that Grandpa was able and willing to help the (lucky!) kid.

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