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Listen to Tiffany’s story as you read it (below).
The lime-green wristband felt heavy – not with age but with technology.
Tiffany sat deep in her favorite armchair, a perfect indentation of comfort molded over two decades, ready for her afternoon date with a documentary about penguins. But the “Inspire-Pro 750” (a well-meaning gift from her granddaughter, Bev) had other ideas.
“TIFFANY, YOU HAVE BEEN INACTIVE FOR 53 MINUTES. GET THOSE STEPS!” the device chirped.
Tiffany sighed. For 60 years, she’d lived without a gadget reminding her to breathe. Yet now, at 78, she was judged by an algorithm that didn’t understand the profound effort of reaching for a second oatmeal raisin cookie.
She felt a familiar flash of anger, quickly replaced by a quiet sense of the absurd. She wasn’t lazy; she was done – done caring about optimizing every minute of her life.
She unbuckled the device, its plastic protesting with a small click. The thing wanted movement? Fine. She wasn’t moving, but something else certainly could.
Standing on her plush ottoman, Tiffany peered up at the ceiling fan. It was a utilitarian fixture, usually serving only to make the air conditioning seem less necessary, but today it looked like a propeller of freedom. Using a twist-tie she had saved from a loaf of bread, she carefully secured the tracker to the tip of one of the fan blades.
She hopped down and flipped the switch to its highest setting. The fan whirred into a chaotic blur.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the synthetic, chirpy voice of the Inspire-Pro 750 burst into the quiet room.
“CONGRATULATIONS! 10,000 STEPS ACHIEVED!”
Tiffany chuckled, settling back into her chair with a cookie in her right hand. The tracker, convinced it was circling the Earth at a blistering pace, was happily fulfilling its purpose while she remained blissfully stationary. She closed her eyes, imagining the tiny, smug little computer inside panicking from speed.
“CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE BURNED 2,000 CALORIES! TIME FOR A MARATHON!”
That’s when the doorbell rang. It was Gary, the cable repairman, two hours early.
The front door opened before Gary could even offer his polite greeting. The synthetic voice, slightly distorted by the fan’s wobble, was screaming from the living room.
“Good afternoon, ma’am, I’m Gary from —”
“CONGRATULATIONS! YOUR HEART RATE IS OPTIMAL FOR PEAK PERFORMANCE!”
Gary stopped mid-sentence, his eyes wide. He scanned the room, looking for a hidden personal trainer or a child’s motorized toy. His gaze finally settled on Tiffany, sitting perfectly still, and the glowing green wristband blurrily orbiting the room above her head.
“Ma’am, is … is everything alright with your ceiling?” Gary asked hesitantly, clutching his clipboard like a shield.
Tiffany took a slow bite of her cookie, savoring the moment of delicious, low-stakes anarchy.
“Oh, that?” she said, pointing languidly up at the whirring menace. “That’s my exercise routine. My granddaughter insisted I get more vigorous cardio, and, quite frankly, the operating manual’s print was too small to read.”
Gary blinked once, then twice. He seemed to realize that any attempt at rational explanation would be futile. He simply nodded, accepted the absurdity, and started looking for the cable access point.
“You have a nice workout, ma’am,” he mumbled as he left, trying hard not to look up.
Tiffany let the situation play out, accepting Gary’s confused compassion with grace. It was silly, irrational, and absolutely unnecessary, but, for the first time in her life, the perception that she was a bit of a kook didn’t bother her.
Now, years later, Tiffany remembers that day as the moment she officially stopped taking herself too seriously. The incident with the fan wasn’t about cheating fitness; it was about learning to laugh at herself.
The Inspire-Pro 750 now sits quietly in a drawer, but the freedom from its relentless judgment is a blessing she carries with her every day. And it’s a story she likes to recall for those new people in her neighborhood who have not yet heard it.
Also hear and read this “parent story” from 2024:
Go to “Ellen’s Slim Changes”
Age: Our greatest asset!
Jim Hasse, ABC, GCDF retired, author of “52 Shades of Graying”
Weekly Stories About Aging Well
“It’s impossible not to love someone whose story you’ve heard.” - Mary Lou Kownacki
Stories about addressing ageism.
Stories about handling ableism.
Stories about thriving during the second half of life.
Accolade: “Love reading your stories. You never disappoint.” - Mary K.
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In grade school, I feared walking down the aisle of any public forum (movie theater, church, school etc.). I would picture myself falling in front of the crowd and the pitiful stares I would get from onlookers because of my cerebral palsy.
In high school, I clung to the hallway lockers for fear I would be trampled by the bigger, more “normal” students, especially the guys in black leather jackets and ducktails (yes, it was the 1950s).
I also had an aversion to four-foot wastebaskets because one time a fellow student (Fran) had to fish me out of one. I had grabbed it for balance and, instead, found myself in the trash, unable to hop over the rim without assistance from Fran.
It was tense at the time, but it turned out to be an incident I would recall for years after with chuckles of acceptance and gratitude.
* When in your life did you discover the ability to laugh at yourself?