Oh, the joys of owning non-water-resistant hearing aids.

This afternoon, I took the kids to a pumpkin patch for our annual trek through nature. A partly cloudy sky and temps in the low 70s seemed like ideal weather for our country excursion. With a stroller for my littlest tyke and a lunch box in tow, we were all set. My kids frolicked through rows of corn and danced on hay bales. All was bliss.

UNTIL…

A drop of water fell on my head. Then more drops. Suddenly, the partly cloudy sky tranformed into a scene from “Twister” (without the tornado). Rain fell so hard, I couldn’t see straight ahead. Where were my kids? The stroller? Then I swatted at my ears.

MY HEARING AIDS WERE GETTING WET.

Everyone should remember this important fact about hearing aids: they are not water resistant. A plunge in the pool or a rinse in the shower or rain falling from the sky can make $5,000 hearing aids die.

Without an umbrella or hooded jacket to protect my listening investment, I panicked. First, I rounded up my littest tyke who was feeding corn kernels to a pen of goats and oblivious to pouring rain. My older two kids sprinted for our mini-van.

Chasing after them while pushing littest tyke in his stroller, I whisked off my hearing aids from behind my ears. I cupped them in my hand and made the most waterproof fist possible.

While nudging the stroller forward with my legs, I used the other hand to reach in the lunchbox. I pulled out the only waterproof item inside: a Ziploc baggy filled with pretzels. I dumped out the bag’s salty contents. Bye-bye, pretzels. Then I dropped the hearing aids inside and sealed the bag. The lunchbox sat in the bottom of the stroller and appeared to be the driest spot within a quarter-mile of pumpkin patch mudlands.

“Clunk,” went the hearing aid-filled baggy as I tossed it into the dry lunchbox.

Then I ran as fast as I could in muddy flip-flops and pushing a stroller, that lunchbox with my expensive listening device treasures inside going “bumpety-bump” all the way to the car.  Oh, the joy.

While my kids didn’t get their pumpkins, their mommy’s expensive, non-water-resistant hearing aids were kept safe in the great outdoors.

-Shanna Groves, http://shannagroves.blogspot.com