Man Interrupted

And man over-board, I suppose.

Or I might just voluntarily walk the plank.

Because it seems being interrupted has become a way of life for me lately.

But let me start over.

Let's go back 10 years; might have been more like 7 years, not sure. I worked that job so long, hard for me to keep track.

But I recall my boss talking to me, in her cubicle, telling me we ought to have more talks; that she didn't get enough chances to talk to me about my job, and that I might need her help, and that she was willing to offer help. She added that other staff were accustomed to interrupting her to talk to her, kind of just barge in on her in her cubicle, and that I never did; and what she said was I never did, due to manners.

I'd have to agree. Now, anyway. Don't know what I said at the time. Probably, Thank you: Or something along those lines.

But I've never been in the habit of interrupting people; I'm cautious, careful, look to see what someone is doing before I come in with what I have to say or ask or do.

I'm like that.

I've been taking care of my 83 year-old mother. She has dementia. I live with her. She often has questions, many of them make no sense, others have already been asked several times in a 15-minute time-span. They are often repeated that way.

And I get interrupted, often, at the rate of every 5 minutes or so. I might be writing, might be reading, might be watching a TV program; but it is certain that every several minutes or less, I'll be interrupted, asked a question, there might be a demand to do something, often unnecessarily.

As you can imagine, during the course of the day, it can chip away at a person. It's like the Vietnam War, a battle of attrition.

I'm watching Doc Martin, I do like the show. Grown fond of it. It's fascinating, and you do have to keep up with it. My mother interrupts during the show at various times. But I'm able to keep up with the plot, nevertheless.

Then 3 minutes to the end, at the climax, somebody walks into the room to talk to me; as if I'm doing nothing, though clearly I'm looking at the TV screen.

That's enough of a set-up. Here's what I mean.

It seems a matter of self-absorption and a lack of awareness. As if what they want, what they want to say or get or do has precedence, or, more accurately, is the only thing that exists. At the same time, there seems to be no awareness that another person is doing something, possibly important, at least to him.

Doesn't quite dawn on them.

And that, I'm afraid, is the problem across the globe.