A Tale of Two Scales

Oh, Friends, I have to tell you something I did the other day that had me tied up in KNOTS.  It's kind of a parable for the way we as human-type-people cannot believe the evidence that's right in front of our eyes.

So.  I used to have a Fitbit Aria scale.  It's one of those smart-scales that you stand on and it takes weight and body fat percentage, then uploads it via WiFi to the Fitbit app, and I can track all those things over time, very easily, without having to type in my weight and BF%.  I had the Aria for years, and back in 2017, it stopped syncing.  It also wasn't weighing right, so I dragged back out the Tanita Body Fat Monitor Scale I've had since... Jeez, the Aughts.  That's a better scale, honestly.  It tracks everything from weight to body composition to BMI to body fat percentage, to bone density to percent of water in the body.  But it isn't a smart scale.  It's been around since before the first smart-scales.  I hold onto it because it's such a good scale.

But I like the way the Fitbit scales just upload their data to my Fitbit account.  I wear a Fitbit on my wrist constantly and I'm not that interesting of a person, so I don't mind the constant surveillance from my fitness trackers.  And back in January, Fitbit sent around a discount for the Aria 2, so I jumped on it and have been happily using my Aria 2 for all these crazy months of 2020 so far. 

Keep in mind, and this is important to this tale, that of course I don't get rid of the Tanita scale, and I also hadn't gotten rid of the original Aria.  And Aria and Aria2 look identical from their standing surfaces.

A couple weeks ago, my husband was doing some repairs in the master bathroom, and he had to move everything out of the way, including my cache of bathroom scales.  When he put everything back, he put back a square black glass smart scale that said "Aria" on it.  No big deal.  I've gone through something of a depressy period, the last few weeks, and haven't been working out or weighing in.  So I haven't stepped on the scale.  But Wednesday night, I got curious to see if all the depressy turmoil to my routine and eating and hydrating has had an appreciable difference on my weight, so I stepped on the Aria2 and... nothing.

Well, probably cheap starter-batteries, I thought.  I brought the scale downstairs Thursday morning and replaced the four batteries.  I couldn't get it to sync with my Fitbit App, so I tried to get it back on the wireless network.  It wouldn't pick up a signal.  So I found the "Help" section of the Fitbit website as it pertains to an Aria 2 scale and spent two hours trying to figure this out.  I was perplexed as to why the battery compartment on my Aria 2 held 4 AA batteries, while the illustration showed a more square compartment that held 3 AAs, and why the reset button wasn't readily accessible like the diagram showed.  I found a little hole in the back of the scale that lets you put an unbent paperclip into it, to reset the scale, and it would start the Setup Process.  It kept saying that our wireless network name was Verizon.

"Why is it saying Verizon?" asked my husband.  He's tech-savvy, so you bet I dragged him into this madness.  "We haven't had that router for years!"

"I know!" I screeched, frustrated tears running down my face and a good sweat-mustache on my upper lip.  "I got this stupid scale in JANUARY.  It shouldn't even know about the Verizon router!"

"Maybe it's something to do with the app," my husband said.

"It shouldn't be something with the stupid app!" I snapped.  "It knew which wireless network to use before I changed the batteries!  And I only got this thing in January!  Why did the batteries go dead in it already?"

"I don't know," he said, trying to find me helpful YouTube Aria 2 Troubleshooting videos.

He found them.  I was frustrated that my Aria 2 didn't look like the presenters' Aria 2s.  He pointed out that my Aria 2 didn't look like theirs, either.  We figured I must have gotten one on the beginning or end of a production run.  Out of frustration, I told the app to forget my Aria 2. 

"It's like we're not even talking about the same scale!!!"  I yelled, stomping both feet into the floor so hard it shook the dining room.  Then I looked at him.  "Wait a minute-"

I flew up the stairs and grabbed the other black Fitbit Scale, which was back in the place it's been since I retired it (but, didn't throw it out, because what if I need a broken smart-scale someday, apparently?)  I flipped it over.  THAT scale said "Aria2" on it, and the back of it looked familiar to me, as I'd been looking at schematics and videos with that exact flip-side for the last.  two.  hours.

"Jee.  Zusss," I said, carrying this scale back into the dining room.  "You're not going to believe this. The Aria2 has been up in the bathroom the whole time.  We've been trying to sync the old broken Aria Original all morning."

"Well, how'd that happen?" my husband asked. 

"When you put everything back, you put the Aria where the Aria 2 goes," I said.  "But I should probably just get rid of the Aria now."

"Probably," my husband said, moving on to things in his life more pressing than an impossible-to-sync-or-troubleshoot smart bathroom scale.

As though by magic, I got my Aria2 set back up and synced, and all is right in my world again, at least as far as smart-scales go.

What's bugged and intrigued me since is that it took me over two hours to figure out that I wasn't even using the correct scale, even though there were all kinds of signs to clue me in.  The back of the scale didn't look like the one in the pictures or troubleshooting videos.  The battery compartments were different.  The Aria had no reset button in the battery compartment; the reset button in the battery compartment of the Aria 2 was plain as day and unmissable.  There was that whole thing with the old scale using 4 batteries and the new one only using 3.

Why did it take two hours for it to occur to me to go up and grab the other Fitbit scale?  Just in case? 

Of course, this makes me feel ridiculous. Like a total idiot.  There was a quick and definitive fix to this gaffe.  But how many times in Life do any of us have a picture of What We Think Is Fact right there in our heads, and we fight so hard to hold onto that picture, despite all the evidence that points to the contrary?

We become hellbent that people don't like us, or that a certain person doesn't like us, even if all their words AND actions indicate otherwise.  OR we hold onto people we believe are friends, and believe the best of them, even as they plunge knives into us- there's always a justification, right?  Or we stick around in a fraught situation, whether it's a relationship, organization, or job, because we think this is just how it is for everyone in the same kind of relationship, club, or occupation. 

I don't know why we do this to ourselves, Friends.  I don't know why our brains let us hold on to our own mistaken beliefs while ignoring all the solid evidence that contradicts those beliefs.  Unless it's just more comfortable to stay in our own feedback loops.  They're familiar there. And stepping out of those feedback loops and listening to new evidence requires some heavy-duty work and effort on our part.  Taking action to correct our wrongs takes even more effort, and even some risk. 

I'll tell you why I didn't instantly go get the other Fitbit Scale when things weren't going right with the one I had right in my hands.  It was all the way upstairs.  I was downstairs.  It's silly to think about, considering I could have saved myself literally hours of frustration and stress and time, but I didn't want to traipse upstairs when I was downstairs.  In hindsight, I would have been so much farther ahead, if I'd done so.

At least all I have to feel over the Tale of Two Scales is an acute sense of feeling silly. Sheepishness.  Facepalm.  But it makes me wonder what other Big Contrary Facts I'm looking right at, but am too blind to see.