Hearing Aid Advertisements
If, like me, you’ve been retired
for some time now, and your mailbox,
like mine, has become the repository
of all sorts of health advertisements –
vitamins, medicines, ointments, organic foods –
all of course urgent offers, even
discount checks, as incentives to purchases
all guaranteed (or your money back if still alive)
to slow down the aging process and renew
your vigor and if you’re male awaken
and enhance your sexual prowess
to what it used to be – if you can still
remember that far back – to when you
were on the summit of the “bloom of youth”
or as close to a Hell you didn’t believe in.
In my case, and for several years now,
I’ve been receiving almost monthly offers
for various hearing aids, accompanied
with generous checks as downpayment, besides.
A particular brand touted better than
all others and far more expensive,
and based on latest technological
breakthroughs and advances, etcetera, etcetera.
In short, a bargain even at the high price.
My hard-of-hearing mother fell for the carrot,
so-to-speak, and purchased a four thousand
dollar “top of the line” aid.
Was it an improvement? Yes, she shouted,
for background noises only! Tired of our shouting
matches and her chronic complaints – and expletives –
I decided to call the promotional company.
Apologies were profuse, but no fault
of the product. Rather my mother’s –
her age, for one, her advanced hearing loss,
for another. And as a consequence, with
weak apologies, no hope for a refund.
Frustrated, I made a final appeal that
no more advertisements be sent to her
and would they kindly remove her name
from their mailing list, to which they agreed,
and to which I responded: Sir, that’s the best
news I’ll ever have to shout at her.
Copyright ©
Maurice Rigoler
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