Valdemar is going to be 80 years old in three years. He owns a little house, which he inherited from his mother. It is located near the mountains in the shadow of a forest. He enjoys being there. His pension is small but Valdemar is content and even managed to put some money aside. As he habitually says, the money’s meant for old age.

He owns a small, very old car, that means very much to him and he fosters it as if it’s his own kid.

Valdemar has three main worries in his life. That his health declines, that his car passes the MOT and that his doctor provides him with the ok to continue driving every second year.

Without his car and his fitness to drive, Valdemar would not be able to drive to his house in the mountains and would have to spend his time in the sad, small city flat, which gets incredibly hot during summer.

Valdemar isn’t good at walking as both of his knees and his hip have been replaced with metal. He can only walk under a lot of pain and very slowly with crutches. At the same time his vision is declining.

Currently he cannot even recognize the third row of letters at the eye test. But he has to, otherwise, the doctor won’t confirm his fitness to drive.

Once, when he was alone in the waiting room at the opticians, he copied all letters from the third and fourth row onto a piece of paper and learnt them off by heart. That is how he passed his eye test. That’s how Valdemar could keep his mobility.

This year there would be the next eye test. Valdemar studiously practiced the two rows of letters. He had stuck them in the kitchen and on the bathroom wall. On the day of his appointment, he shaved, went to the hairdresser the previous day and put on an ironed shirt.

In the waiting room, he was a little nervous but he tried to suppress it, after all, he was very well prepared. When he walked into the doctor’s office, cold sweat ran down his back. The office had been refurnished and modernized. The old board with the letters wasn’t on the wall any more. Only a white, electric box, that probably projects letters was stuck to the wall. Valdemar knew, he wouldn’t be able to pass the test. The only thing that he could think of was to pretend to faint and he did a great job at it. That is how he could avoid the embarrassment of failing the test today. But he knew he could only save his car and his house in the mountains with deceit, because his eyes weren’t strong enough any more.

How he did achieved this, I will tell you another time.

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