Sunday, February 17, 2013

Tunnel Vision

I've joked with friends in the past about how our husbands seem to have tunnel vision (or no vision) when it comes to looking for things.  This exchange has played out numerous times in our household:

Meezy: "Where is the so-and-so?"

Me: "It's in the drawer."

Meezy: "I looked there.  I didn't see it."

Me: Walks to drawer.  Opens it.  Pulls out the brown so-and-so.

Meezy: "Oh, I thought the so-and-so was black, so I didn't see it."

He's explained it to me before as a phenomenon where he has a picture in his head of what the thing he's searching for should look like, so if it strays from his mental picture, he just can't see it.  A prime example happened in the car today.  We were headed to Fedex, and he was driving.  He asked me where it was located, and I said, "It's on the right, before the liquor store.  The next street after is Inwood/Addison Rd."  He knows where the liquor store is because we went there just a couple weeks ago. He also knows where Inwood/Addison Rd is. I figured my instructions were pretty clear, so I went back to answering emails on my phone.  The next time I look up, we're at Inwood Rd, and we have passed Fedex. 

Me: "What are you doing? Why did you pass it?"

Meezy: "I didn't see it."

Me: "I told you it was on the right, before the liquor store, before Inwood Rd."

Meezy: "Yeah, I just didn't see it."

We make a U-turn and go back to it, and as we're pulling up to the building with the purple Fedex awning, he says, "Oh, that's why.  I thought Fedex was orange."

Sigh.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Must be the Amarillo water. I suffer from this same disease and it drives Katie crazy.