AO x4

AO x4 is said as "alert and oriented times four." It is the tabulated result after a patient, client, or resident has been asked a series of questions to verify his/its/their/her alertness and orientation

Here's what the types of orientation mean:

• Oriented to person: The person knows his/her name and usually can recognize significant others.
• Oriented to place: The person knows where he/she is, such as the hospital, clinic, or town.
• Oriented to time: The person knows the time of day, date, day of the week, and season.
• Oriented to situation: He/she can explain why he/she is to the doctor.

Sometimes, generally after work, I will take a nap before making the evening meal. A nap is usually a period of time that is an hour or less. However, since I am a sound sleeper and one that can be knocked out rather quickly, there are times when the sleep lasts longer. During the months when the days are longer, this ability to sleep easily sometimes has me awaken with a start. It usually happens if I hit the pillow at around 5:00 pm and then get up at 7:00 pm. I will look at the digital 12-hour clock and then note that it is still light outside. I wake up in a disoriented stupor; not knowing if I had slept for two hours or had slept through the entire evening.

As I age, I worry about some of these questions. Working or going to school forces us to know the date, day of the week, month, season, and the like. I have the date on the lower left of my computer screen, but the information doesn't include the day of the week. In my younger days, we knew the days of the week based on what programs were on the television. But in my world and life, this information is blurry and muddy. It doesn't matter what day of the week it is if you're doing weeding, or cleaning a toilet. The only tasks that I truly relegate to the weekends are fixing large amounts of food for the rest of the week's lunch or laundry.

So what will become of me when I retire? These days I don't even eat that much at mealtime so a pound of macaroni, for example, could hold me through eight meals. The same could be said for a cup of rice. I wonder what will happen when I find I can no longer touch type, or recognize the names that are in my cell phone directory (or personal phone book). There will come a time when I might not be able to buy, write, seal, and stamp a holiday card or to write a check to pay a bill.

All those years of squirreling money into savings accounts with higher yield, investments into mutual funds, diversions of pay into savings bonds or savings plans and work will be undone and the person who had lived so frugally and who had minded his credit score so vigilantly will not know who he is or what a carbohydrate does.

Why do such thoughts come to mind. Women of the last two generations on my Mother's side had end-of-life living with dementia. My grandmother was certain that spirits were walking through the front door of her apartment and were confounding her dishes. My Mother--who was a full-charge bookkeeper--couldn't understand what was meant by a self-deposited Social Security check. "They say that one of the early signs of dementia is the inability to handle money."

Some folks were never skilled at handling money. I never had a big problem with it because I never had much of it. I could always figure out a way to cut back; don't smoke, buy store brand items, serve meals using portion control, save vegetable skins and the liquid by-product of beans and make soup stock.

1 - My name is Duncan MacLeod.
2 - I'm home. In my living room. On the computer.
3 - It is Monday, the 1st day of the work week. It's the last week of August. Autumn begins in September.
4 - I'm on the computer because I could not sleep and it is horribly hot in here.

I have opted to live alone. Even when I have taken in tenants, I still feel alone. They are borders who don't interact with me.

In the end... will it matter if I know who I am, or who you are? What probably matters (or will matter) is that my body be properly identified and that the remains be disposed of as I wish (or in a proper manner).

And yes... these are my musings at 0240 on a Monday when the room is too hot for me to sleep comfortably.