The art of forgetting
February 5, 2022, 8:05 am , by Richard Lutz
Richard Lutz loses that free ticket to everywhere
Yup, I’ve gone and done it. I’ve lost my bus pass. It was there…right THERE… in the special place in my jacket. And then it went and disappeared. Vanished. Free travel one minute. Paying full fare the next.
Usually, the pass is in my wallet- actually right next to the driving licence and the supermarket discount card. But then I switched it to that special place in the winter coat and that was a bad bad move. The bus pass is gone. And that’s expensive.
And annoying. Y’see, I can normally blame someone else for my woes: the government, the neighbours, my family, the gods above, the dark forces below, the police, Vladimir Putin.
But tragically, I’ve got no choice now but to slap my own wrists, lead myself down to the cells and face the truth. I lost the bloody thing. I’m to blame. And so I had no choice but to try to track the thing down. I carefully retraced the steps of my last few days but still couldn’t find that pensioner’s ticket to a free ride. Eventually, though, amid the dross and detritus and ephemera of my past week, I pinpointed the last time it was used in anger….a bus trip in deepest Dumfrieshire wearing a jacket I rarely use.
Maybe it’s still bouncing around in a bus on little country roads…
My last memory is taking the pass out that jacket for the bus, slapping it on the swipe device, and then….well, I really don’t know what happened then. Maybe it’s still travelling up and over the county’s little hilly roads crammed behind a seat. Maybe it’s been ground into public transport dust by a thousand bus passengers’ feet. Or stolen by a mountebank hell bent on a life of bus pass fraud. Or left in a bar. Or not left in a bar. Or it’s lying next to that green opal ring from Australia that just up and disappeared a couple of years ago. Or god knows what else. Or where else.
Of course, loads of folks sharing my demographic know the score: one minute you’re forgetting where you left your keys (or bus pass) and the next minute you’re forgetting what you’re even searching for or why you’re ripping apart the kitchen. Or why you’re going up the stairs. Or why you’re sitting down when you should have been going up those stairs, the very stairs you forgot why you were going up five minutes before. I guess it’s the art of forgetting and the crucial art of how to…hold on, I just had a moment. Where was I just then?
Anyway, I’ve learned things, things I can now add to a list of evergrowing vital advice tips, such as:
- Never keep your bus pass in that ’special’ place. Keep it in your wallet
- Never go food shopping when you’re hungry
- Never cook when hungry
- Never put your glasses in a locked locker when you need them to see the combination lock numbers on your locker to unlock the locked locker (this is based on humiliating personal experience)
- Never bet on an inside straight at the poker table
- Another piece of advice that I just forgot
share this post!
Nicholas J H DENT
All too true…and very good advice. Most fatal all is moving something the whereabouts of which you are quite familar with to a “safe” place because you think it will be “safer” there. That will be the last of it you ever see. Like your ‘special’ place….
Alan Holland
Absolute gospel Richard.
But you do know that the day after the replacement arrives your lost bus pass will turn up?
JWS
Aren’t you too old for a bus pass?
Eve Sinclair
Enjoyed this with our porridge this morning
Henry Heggan
I especially liked the tip about not locking your glasses in the combination safe where you need the glasses to read the combination.
Jim Burke
It has been said, about a man getting old……
First, you forget names. Then, you forget faces. Then, you forget to zip up your fly. Then, you forget to unzip your fly.
Joel Mandelbaum
Welcome to geezerdom
Julie Osborn
Endlessly entertaining, as usual. Happily, you have not forgotten how to create memorable images.
Janis purdue
And never grow old, then you’ll never have ‘senior moments’.B
Karl Fisch
Well… have you found the bus pass yet ?
Donal McGiven
It’s in the place where lost thing go!
William Kerr
Great stuff, Richard…I share your pain! 🤣
Bob Riley
Bus pass of doom
Subscribe to new posts.