A reader from Nichols called me a while back. A nice call, not one of those, \u201cThat thing you wrote about riding a bicycle facing traffic was stupid!\u201d This guy was okay with what I had written and called to offer a suggestion for an article. He\u2019d just come from the UHS, walk in facility on the Vestal Parkway across from SUNY Binghamton. His nose was red, crooked and puffy. Not from an illness, from walking into the automatic door. It opened too slowly.<\/p>\n
I immediately identified with his mishap. I have door problems too: buildings with six sets of double doors where only one door is unlocked, buildings with an outer and an inner door and you are confronted with a social dilemma (do you thank the person in front of you who held each door open or do you wait until after you get through the 2nd door. Two thank you\u2019s or one? That\u2019s the dilemma). \u00a0And, automatic doors of course; they open too slowly or too fast and worse of all, they make you think that all public doors will automatically open and you get banged up when you walk into one that doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
A slow opening, auto-door, like the one he encountered at UHS is a perfect example of why getting around gets trickier and trickier as you age. They are not as bad as revolving doors, which should have a warning posted on them saying, \u201cNo seniors allowed.\u201d But back to the reader from Nichols problem, slow opening automatic doors. It\u2019s an issue that can go either way. The opening speed is based on an architect\u2019s assessment of how fast the people using it can walk. The designer has to pick between someone with a stride like Wilt the Stilt, or someone who creeps along with tiny baby steps, like Tim Conway when he played an old man on the Carol Burnett show. The UHS architect opted for the Tim Conway stride and my reader from Nichols ended up smashing his nose.<\/p>\n
If you\u2019re scratching your head at this point, wondering why someone would walk smack into one of these slow opening doors, you don\u2019t understand old coots. Slow or fast, we aren\u2019t paying attention; we\u2019re fumbling in our wallets or pockets in a panic, to make sure we have our insurance cards and the list of questions we want to ask the doctor. And, even though we checked when we left the house and again when we got out of the car, we still check again when we get to the door and become distracted. I don\u2019t know why we bother with the questions. The doctor gives us the same answer for every one, \u201cYou have to expect that at your age.\u201d<\/p>\n
I went to the UHS facility where the Nichols guy got his nose job, to see how slow the door really was. Unfortunately, it was perfectly timed for me. I didn\u2019t realize how much my stride had slowed down until then. I doubt if I could beat Tim Conway in a race. I guess I should expect that at my age.<\/p>\n
Complaints? Questions? \u2013 send to mlessler7@gmail.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A reader from Nichols called me a while back. A nice call, not one of those, \u201cThat thing you wrote about riding a bicycle facing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-48639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\n