Eulogy to my headset

My unfounded-in-anything description of schizophrenia is a severe disorganization of thoughts and actions. There are well-researched positive and negative symptoms, brain patterns, and behaviors, but what it comes down to is that the reality experienced by an individual dealing with schizophrenia is radically different from that agreed-upon reality of society.

I often think of these various "realities" even more specifically. When I just don't "get" a friend of mine -- Why would she buy a new pair of shoes for a date? Why did he just arrive late for a midterm in order to pick his Fantasy Football team? -- I consider it in terms of the realities we share, or don't. I have found that most, but definitely not all, of my closest friends share my reality with me.

At any rate, I opened this whole discussion to lead into the main topic for this post: my headset. In the summer after my freshman year of college I worked in a physics research lab approximately an hour and a half (2.5 hours in traffic) from home. Among other life modifications, I bought my headset -- a single cord with an ear clip, a microphone in the cord, and a convenient plug to my phone. Thus I could drive and talk on the phone without using my hands. I should emphasize that this purchase occurred in the summer of 2004, years before these sorts of headsets were common (I talk like I'm 80).

I grew dependent on this headset, using it even when I wasn't driving but because my bag was heavy and I didn't want to lift my arm to talk on the phone or because it was cold out, and this way I could keep my phone in my pocket (how many of you are thinking, "Man, this wacko is in her own reality"?). People often wouldn't notice that I was on the phone and would either (1) talk to me, requiring me to be rude to either the person on the phone or embarrass the approacher in public (the situation usually resolved itself with me having to talk over my phone buddy saying, "Wait, Mom, hold on, wait, Mom, one second, Mom? hold on please" or (2) assume I'm talking to myself and give me a wide berth as I walk along. After one such #1, my mom remarked to me, "Judy dolly, you and people with headsets are giving people with schizophrenia a new social acceptability." This observation intrigued me.

Last Thursday, I was in the airport and bumped into an acquaintance. As he was running off to deal with our delayed flight, my phone started vibrating. I plugged in my headset to answer the call to the astonishment of my acquaintance/new friend. He thought it was outrageous that I used the headset for something so simple as a basic phone conversation.

Later, on the plane, he was sitting in the seat behind me and we were discussing how to spend the plane ride. The flight attendant came up to me and said curtly, "Ma'am, are you powered down?" I had been talking to my friend while facing forward -- he could hear me perfectly but it looked like I was talking to myself. In just three short years, the assumption switched from schizophrenia to BlueTooth.

Tonight, my headset died. Or more accurately, it got really quiet so that each person can kind of make out what the other person says, but not actually have a conversation. But my first thought, instead of wondering how this change will impact my empathy with people with schizophrenia, was: how can I play computer games while talking on the phone?