I'm published! (TBT)

This is my first Throwback Thursday post! Since Brandt is doing so amazingly well with his implants, I don't really have anything new to report. So I wanted to share my story "Homeless Tequila" that was published in the 2011 edition of UALR's Quills and Pixels nonfiction literary journal. The stories will be familiar if you've read all my posts, but they're synthesized into one piece. Enjoy!

"Homeless Tequila"

I have bounded into the silent living room and found my hard-of-hearing husband Brandt sitting in his recliner, watching Mythbusters on television.  It’s on mute, and he is concentrating on the closed-captioning text scrolling across the screen.  I yell “Hi honey!” to announce my presence.

Unable to hear my approaching footsteps, he has responded—as usual—to my loud salutation by jumping in his seat and screaming in terror. 

“Hang on, I’m Earless!” he grumbles from his recliner, reaching for the beige hearing aids sitting on the coffee table.  As he pops them in, he pictures himself as Mr. Potato Head, inserting his comically large plastic ears. 

To make amends, I cheerfully screech, “Oh honey, you’re so cute!”

A mixture of pain and confusion pulls down his face.  “Why am I ‘Homeless Tequila’?” he asks. 

I stammer, laughing, “Wh—What?!” 

Near tears, he continues.  “Why would you call me that?!  I would never call you something like that!  That’s just mean, how would you feel if I greeted you like that?”

This wasn’t our first big misunderstanding, but it was by far the worst.  Or was it the best?  Well, it was certainly the funniest.

Brandt and I had been together for a few years at that point, and he’d been wearing hearing aids for several years before we met.  He first noticed a problem during his senior year of high school, and was diagnosed with mild hearing loss (about the decibel level of a loud whisper).  But it was graduate school before he accepted that he could no longer function without hearing aids. 

His hearing loss wasn’t an issue for me, because, by fate, luck, or random chance, I had spent my entire life connected to people with hearing loss.  Aunt Louise, my great-aunt, godmother, and namesake, went deaf at age 20 from an antibiotic and became a legend in the hearing loss community.  She helped establish the Arkansas Deaf Relay (one of the first in the country) and was a well-known advocate for captioning and other issues vital to people with hearing loss.  In 2004 she became the first adult in the state to have bilateral Cochlear Implants (commonly called “CIs”)—surgically implanted electronic devices that digitally replace hearing in deaf people who do not benefit from hearing aids, which can only amplify sound.  My Grandma Jean also had a hearing loss, caused by a childhood bout with scarlet fever.  Her hearing was restored by the same world-renowned UAMS surgeon who implanted Aunt Louise’s Cochlear Implants.  And my good friend of 10 years, Josie, was born with severe hearing loss and has worn hearing aids all her life. 

But I quickly learned that being in a relationship with someone with a hearing loss is a lot different from having a family member or close friend with it.  It affects just about every aspect of our life together.

We avoided parties and busy restaurants because it was impossible for Brandt to communicate with anyone, including me.  At my family’s big holiday gatherings, he would run off to a quiet corner and play on his cell phone. 

We couldn’t see movies in the theater near our house in Memphis because there weren’t any captioned showings.  I surprised him with tickets for the new Star Trek’s opening weekend—the closest showing with captions was four hours away in Nashville.  That was a long drive just to see a movie, but it was worth it.

Music all but disappeared from my life, since it was “distracting background noise” in the car, the house, and at friends’ dinner parties.  I got in the habit of asking the hostess if she’d mind turning off the satellite radio, because Brandt couldn’t understand anyone with it playing. 

My beloved live theater and musicals disappeared as well, since the closest theater that offered captioning was 800 miles away in Minneapolis—way too far to drive.  It was torturous living so close to touring Broadway productions, and not being able to attend any of them, but it was pointless to spend $100 on a show that he couldn’t understand, and I would feel too guilty laughing with the rest of the audience while he wondered what hilarious joke he had just missed.

But the biggest problem, by far, was the misunderstandings.  After the “Homeless Tequila” incident, I told Brandt that he needed to get his hearing checked.  He came back from his audiologist appointment announcing that his hearing was “just the same,” and he didn’t need it tested.  I had a hard time believing it, but didn’t push the issue.  The misunderstandings continued, multiplying in frequency.

Dancing into the living room one Saturday afternoon, I excitedly shouted that I had cured my hiccups. 

Brandt looked down at the wide flares of my jeans, horrified, yelling, “You cut your pants off?!”

Driving up to Brandt’s high school gymnasium for his ten-year reunion, I asked, “Does this bring back a lot of memories?”

“Does it bring back ovaries?!” he asked in disbelief.

Talking about dinner one night, I suggested we have steak. 

“I—what?!” Brandt exclaimed.

“A steak.  You know, red meat?  Why, what did you hear?” I asked. 

“I thought you said that I STANK!”

“No, actually you smell really good!  I said steak, or really, anything that comes from a cow.”

“How about a wallet?” he asked, smirking.

And my whispered (and not-so-whispered) “I love you’s” were increasingly met with blank stares and no response.

After several painfully long moments, he would finally ask, “Wait, what did you say?”

This went on for more than a year, and I again asked Brandt to go to the audiologist for a hearing test.  Again, he came home saying it was “still just the same.”

This time, I didn’t believe it.  I held out my hand and asked for the results of his test.

“Well, he didn’t do a real hearing test.  He played some beeps, and I could hear them fine, so he said I didn’t need a full hearing test.”

I may not have a degree in audiology, but I knew this couldn’t be right.  So I asked Aunt Louise, Grandma Jean, and my friend Josie what they thought about the situation, and the response from all three was a resounding “GET HIS HEARING TESTED!” 

I sent Brandt back to his audiologist, again, and he came back without a hearing test, again, with the explanation that “my hearing hasn’t changed, my brain is just getting old now that I’m almost 30, and I can’t process sounds as fast.” 

I’d had enough.  I called to make an appointment for Brandt with Aunt Louise and Grandma Jean’s ENT surgeon, whom we affectionately call “Dr. Awesome.”  His waiting list was a year long, and no amount of name-dropping could get us in any faster.

In the meantime, I decided to educate myself as much as possible.  I became certified as a Hearing Loss Support Specialist, learning everything I could about hearing tests, disability law, and assistive technologies. 

And I started learning American Sign Language, thinking that it would help reduce our misunderstandings.  Unfortunately, Brandt was too busy teaching full-time and attending classes for his doctorate to attend ASL classes.  I decided to take them alone, and try to teach him the signs at home.  It didn’t work as well as I’d hoped, since he wasn’t actively studying and practicing the words.  The misunderstandings continued to worsen.

One night while Brandt was grading papers, I asked him, “Why are you grumbling, honey?”

With a hurt look on his face, he responded, “I’m not ugly!” 

I was a little taken aback.  “Of course you’re not ugly, you’re adorable!  I asked why you were GRUMBLING.”

“Oh!” he said, laughing.  “I’m grumbling because I’m tired, but I have to finish grading before I can go to bed.  By the way, ears SUCK!”

We started relying on text messages for grocery shopping, after talking on the phone turned into me screaming the same word ten times:

“You need me to pick up hot dogs at Kroger?…  No?…  You’re not saying ‘hot dogs’?…  It sounds like ‘hot dogs’…  Hot.  Dogs…  What do hot dogs have to do with Italian food?…  Oh, PASTA!”

And it became nearly impossible to have a conversation when he was “Earless.”  I used to simply talk louder to overcome his lack of hearing aids, but now, even if he cupped his hands behind his ears and concentrated on reading my lips, he could only get a few words.  When he started to reach for his hearing aids, I’d wave my hand and say, “Nevermind, it’s not important.  I’ll just tell you later….”

            Finally, the long-awaited appointment with Dr. Awesome arrived.  First Brandt had to have a complete hearing test; the audiologist couldn’t believe that it hadn’t been tested in six years.  I told her the story about “his brain’s just getting old” from his last doctor, and she was horrified.

Brandt sat inside a little booth, raising his hand when he heard beeps, and repeating back words.  At least, he attempted to repeat back words.

            “Hot dog,” she said.

            Uh-oh, he’s going to say “pasta,” I thought to myself.

            “Oprah?” he asked.  “I know you couldn’t be saying ‘Oprah,’ but it sounds like ‘Oprah’!”

            The next word was “baseball.”

            “Muumuu?” he asked.  “Again, I know you couldn’t have just said ‘muumuu,’ but I swear that’s what it sounded like!”

            “Cowboy,” she said.

            “‘Oprah’ again?!” he asked, exasperated.

            The results of the test were distressing.  Brandt’s hearing loss had nearly doubled over the past six years—from an average loss of 40 decibels, to 70.  And his Speech Discrimination was even worse.  He had dropped from getting 99% of the words correct, to only 24%.  I started crying, for two reasons.  First, I was devastated.  And second, I was relieved to find out that I’d been right all along.

            After the testing, we met with Dr. Awesome, who has a hearing loss himself.  He predicted that Brandt would probably go completely deaf within five years, and would be a candidate for Cochlear Implants.  For now, he was “in the Gray Area” and would have to be equipped with $10,000 worth of hearing technologies to (possibly) help him function until he becomes a Cochlear Implant candidate.  We left the appointment in shock—he was going to get a Cochlear Implant in only 5 years?  Aunt Louise was shocked as well—she thought he was already a candidate and was disappointed that he had to wait that long!

            Brandt’s beige hearing aids that fit inside his ears were replaced with powerful cobalt-blue ones that sit behind his ears.  He got a Bluetooth transmitter that sends his cell phone and other audio devices directly into the hearing aids.  And he acquired a personal FM microphone system, which can either be worn around a speaker’s neck, or placed on a table.  When I wear it, it sits right on my cleavage.  I get a lot of curious stares directed at my chest.

            I was enthusiastic about all this new stuff, sure that it would increase Brandt’s comprehension and decrease our misunderstandings.  Alas, that was not the case.  Each of the pieces of technology broke at least once and had to be sent back to the company for repairs.  We couldn’t go more than a month without having to drive in for another adjustment or repair—that’s 23 trips to Little Rock and back in less than 18 months, just for audiologist appointments.

And those misunderstandings?  Well, they didn’t get any better.  In fact, I’m positive they got worse.

Sitting on the couch watching a (captioned) movie, I yelled “Don’t move!” as I reached up to remove a stray eyelash stuck to Brandt’s cheek.

Thinking I had exclaimed “What’s that?!” instead, he quickly turned toward me, and my long fingernail jabbed him in the eye.  Luckily it didn’t do any lasting damage, but it definitely hurt him.

            When a waiter or waitress asked for our drink and food orders, I answered first so that Brandt would know what the question was.  This didn’t solve all our problems, since Brandt always nods his head in agreement when they say something, assuming that the question is “How is everything?” (even if the question was actually, “Do you need anything else?”, “Did you want dessert?”, or, once, “Do you own the black BMW in the parking lot?”  The waitress kept complimenting his fancy vehicle, but wondered why he wasn’t concerned that his headlights were on).

            We had to wait another year for Brandt’s checkup with Dr. Awesome.  One month before his appointment, Aunt Louise passed away unexpectedly.  The only thing that held me together was focusing on the upcoming appointment, and I became obsessed with the idea of Brandt getting a Cochlear Implant.

I was convinced that his hearing and comprehension had gotten worse, but the tests proved me wrong.  Despite the lack of decline, Dr. Awesome wondered if Brandt’s understanding and functioning could improve with a Cochlear Implant in his worse ear, and hearing aid in his better ear.  He sent us off for an evaluation.

            I tried to keep my expectations low, but I desperately wanted him to be approved for the surgery.  Aunt Louise’s life had completely changed after getting her Cochlear Implants—she had even started attending the Symphony shortly before her death, and could pick out each instrument being played.

            After two hours of beeps and words, it all came down to the final test:  Sentence Perception in Best-Aided Condition (wearing hearing aids).  If he scored better than 60% on the sentences, Brandt couldn’t be a Cochlear Implant candidate.  I wasn’t worried; I knew he wouldn’t do very well.  I had 5 years’ worth of misunderstandings to back me up!

            But he did do well.  Really well.  Even though he repeated each word slowly, hesitantly, and ended each sentence with, “but-that-couldn’t-possibly-be-right,” he was right.  Out of ten sentences, he only missed five words.  90%. 

The audiologist conducting the evaluation said afterwards, shaking her head, “Ok, you did a little too well on that test…WAY too well, actually.  You’re not a Cochlear Implant candidate.  Not even close.” 

The room started spinning, and I could feel the tears pooling in my eyes.  I tried to explain that there’s no way he could have done that well—didn’t she notice how unsure he was repeating the words?  And what about all those misunderstandings?! 

None of my protests made a difference.  Our long list of misunderstandings didn’t matter; all that counted was his 90% in the testing booth.  A three-minute test sent all my hopes crashing down.  We will have to wait at least a year before he can be reevaluated.

A few days later, when I’d calmed down just slightly, I asked Brandt how he felt about the evaluation.  He shrugged, and in his ever-so-calm way, said, “Eh, I’ll get a Cochlear Implant eventually.  I just feel sorry for you, having to deal with my crappy hearing.  But at least you get to keep adding to that long list of my misunderstandings!”

So we’re still stuck in the Gray Area of hearing loss, where Italian food is made with hot dogs, high school reunions bring back ovaries, and the ultimate insult is calling Brandt an ugly, stinky Homeless Tequila.

Nice Car!

On Friday night, Brandt and I went for a nice long walk (hasn’t the weather been wonderful?!) and then went to one of our favorite restaurants.  For whatever reason, the seating hostess always tries to seat us in the room with the sports bar.  It’s loud enough in the regular dining area, so adding the noise of 2 big-screen televisions and screaming football fans is just impossible.  The hostess always thinks it’s strange when I ask her to sit away from the bar.

About halfway through our dinner, she came up to our table and asked Brandt, “Do you own the black BMW?”  He nodded, and I knew that he thought she was asking if his meal was good.  Before I could jump in, she said “You do?  Wow!  Nice car!  Well your headlights are on…”  He smiled and nodded again.  I opened my mouth to tell him what was going on, when she again told him his headlights were on and he needed to turn them off.  I shook my head and said, “No, we don’t own a BMW, sorry…”  She looked at Brandt, confused.  “But, he said you did.”  I shook my head again.  “He didn’t hear you right.”

I turned to Brandt and explained what had happened.  “Oh, I thought you were asking if my food was ok.  It’s good!” he said.  Then I had to re-explain to the hostess that no, we don’t own the BMW and it was all a misunderstanding.

As we were leaving the restaurant, Brandt asked me, “Did you see the couple next to us?”  The older couple?”  I nodded.  “They were celebrating their anniversary!” he said.  Puzzled, I said, “I heard them order some sort of wine, but how’d you know it was their anniversary?  Did they have cards or something?”  Very proudly, he said, “Nope, I read their lips!  The man toasted ‘To another 23 wonderful years.  Happy Anniversary.’”  I was amazed!  “You can read lips that well?!  And you were eavesdropping on their conversation?!”  He smirked.  “Yep.  It keeps me somewhat connected to my surroundings!”

  

Lovely Sandwich

I think my hearing is getting worse…

Over the weekend, our friends Cassie and Basil came to visit, and I had a really hard time understanding either of them unless I was looking right at them.  Riding in the backseat of their car, I strained and struggled to make sense of their words, and walking around at the zoo was equally difficult because I was walking several steps behind them (I was really tired!).  I’ve known Cassie for 15 years, and I don’t remember ever having trouble understanding her in person.  I’ve had some difficulty on the phone with her for the past few years, but I assumed that was (mostly) due to us talking on cell phones.

I don’t have a problem with hearing sounds, I don’t think.  I can still hear all the little pops and creaks of our house late at night, and the random annoying neighborhood sounds.  But my speech comprehension is not doing so well.

Last night after dinner, Brandt was getting dessert, about 8 feet from the kitchen table where I was sitting.  I asked him what he’d had for lunch, and I swear I clearly heard him say, “A lovely grilled chicken sandwich.”  I laughed and said, “A lovely chicken sandwich?  And what made it so lovely?”  He looked confused and said, “Well, it was grilled, and it had lettuce...you know, nice and healthy.”  Apparently he had said “HEALTHY grilled chicken sandwich,” not “lovely.”  {sigh}

Subway

We went to Subway for a quick dinner last night, and Brandt ordered his sandwich first while I was still deciding.  One of the two girls working there asked him if he wanted his sub toasted, and he didn’t hear her.  She looked at him expectantly and he said, “I’m sorry, did you ask me something?”  She repeated the question, and he didn’t understand her.  She said it again, pointing to the toaster.  Brandt said, “TOASTED!  Yes, I want my sandwich toasted.  Sorry, I’m deaf…” 

Both girls laughed, and the one making his sandwich said, “Ha, you’re deaf.  That’s funny!”  Then she asked what all he wanted on his sandwich, and again he didn’t understand her.  She looked at him and said, “Wait, are you kidding?”  He cupped his hand behind his ear and said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t understand you…” 

Now they weren’t sure what to think.  I debated when I should chime in.  “You’re not really deaf…right?” one of them asked.  “I’m sorry?” he said, looking confused.  The two girls looked at each other, getting uncomfortable.  “You’re just playing, right?  You’re not really deaf!” the second girl said nervously. 

“No, he’s really deaf,” I finally jumped in.  “He’s not kidding, he’s deaf.”

Brandt took out one of his hearing aids and showed it to them.  They both gasped.  “Oh my lord, I am so so sorry!” one shrieked.  “Oh my god, I can’t believe I said that to you, I’m so sorry you’re deaf!!” the other said. 

He waved them off, chuckling, and said, “Oh, don’t worry about it.  I’m used to it.”

I thought it was interesting that Brandt used the word “deaf” instead of “hearing-impaired” (he doesn’t like the more politically-correct term “hard-of-hearing”).  Each term brings up different connotations and different expectations about how a person might be able to hear and interact.  Just like the choice of using “hearing-impaired” versus “hard-of-hearing,” it’s a personal choice to use “deaf” instead.  My hearing is technically impaired, although not nearly as much as Brandt; and I can interact with others—for example, the girls at Subway—much easier than he can.  So by saying that he is “deaf,” it’s a quick way to let others know that he’s probably going to have a difficult time understanding them the first time they ask a question.

“Love Hurts”

I’ve had a migraine this week (along with the constant whooshing) that is finally getting better, so tonight we went out to our favorite sushi restaurant to celebrate.  We didn’t want to sit at the hibachi tables, but there weren’t any regular seats available either.  So we ended up sitting at the sushi bar, watching the sushi chefs assemble all those delicious rolls (some of which were made with a large blowtorch!).

It was hard to hear, because there were two couples next to us who were really enjoying their beers, causing them to shout and laugh quite loudly.  There was also music playing overhead, of course, so Brandt was having trouble hearing, of course.  I was sitting right next to him, which helped some.

I try not to sing along with music, because it really bugs Brandt, but sometimes I forget.  “Love Hurts” started playing, and I couldn’t help but sing along for a minute.  Brandt looked around, confused, and asked, “What are you saying?  What’d I miss?”  I laughed and said, “Sorry, I was singing ‘Love Hurts.’”  He nodded, still confused. 

I started singing again with the last line, “Oooooooooh ooooooh, looooove huuuuurrrrttsssss!”  Brandt again looked confused, and asked, “What are you singing now?”  I chuckled; “Sorry, it’s still ‘Love Hurts.’”  This time I signed “LOVE HURTS” as I spoke.  He nodded again.  “Well, that’s better than the last song, I guess…”  I smirked; “What was the last song?”

“‘Loafers,’ you said.  Strange topic for a song.”

Ah yes, the classic 1975 hit “Loafers” by Nazareth.

’S Wrong! ’S Word!

I’ve written before about funny and confusing closed-captioning mistakes; they’re a never-ending source of entertainment and I keep a running list of my favorites.

I’m a big fan of Gilmore Girls.  Even though I’ve seen every episode several times, I still record it on DVR every day and play it in the background while I’m writing e-mails or reading a book.  Last night I was watching the episode “’S Wonderful, ’S Marvelous,” where Christopher takes Lorelei on a romantic date to watch the musical Funny Face.  I was typing an e-mail but looked up to watch the captioning as the final scene of the movie was playing, since I often have trouble understanding song lyrics and accents.  Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn were dressed in their white wedding attire, singing their love for each other: 

“You can’t blame me for feeling avarice/

Oh! ’S wonderful! ’S marvelous!/
That you should care for me!”

Wait…what?  “AVARICE”?!  Let’s check Merriam-Webster, shall we?

av·a·rice:  excessive or insatiable desire for wealth or gain

Umm… Maybe we should check the actual lyrics of this beloved Gershwin song:

“You’ve made my life so glamorous/

You can't blame me for feeling amorous…”

am·o·rous:  strongly moved by love; enamored

There, that’s better!

  

Another Birthday?

One of the last times the whooshing tinnitus in my right ear started up, it was right after eating at our favorite Mexican restaurant.  So after the whooshing completely went away again over the weekend, I wanted to test my theory that it was being caused by food (cheese dip and chicken fajitas—yum!).

The biggest drawback to this restaurant—and most restaurants, for that matter—is the noise.  There is always music playing in the overhead speakers, and sports playing on the flat-screen televisions.  We always bring the FM system, which helps cut out the background noise and amplify my voice, but it’s never a perfect setup. 

Someone was celebrating their birthday, which means the entire restaurant staff came out singing and clapping.  Brandt jumped and asked, “What on earth is that?!”  “Birthday,” I explained.  When we were done eating, we still had a lot of food left over and asked for some to-go boxes.  Our waiter dropped off the boxes and ran off, and I said, “I think we need to ask him for a bag.”  Brandt shrugged and said, “I don’t know, I guess you’d know better than I would.”  I’ve gotten pretty good at being able to tell when he’s mis-heard me, and I knew this was one of those times.  I furrowed my eyebrows, signaling that we were having a misunderstanding.  “Ok, what did you really say?” he asked.  “What did you hear?” I asked.  “There’s another birthday in the restaurant?  People are singing again?”  I shook my head and said, “No…I said I think we need a bag from the waiter, to carry all these boxes.”  He thought for a moment and said, “That wasn’t even close, was it?  And just how did I score a 90% on that sentence test?!”

As our waiter was clearing the plates off the table, I picked the FM transmitter up off the table and reattached it on my neckloop.  The waiter looked at it quizzically and asked me, “What’s that thing for?”  I explained that it was a microphone for Brandt’s hearing aids, and pointed at his ears.  “So, he can’t hear anything without that thing?” he asked.  “Well, a little…” I tried to explain.  We both looked at Brandt, who motioned towards his ears, shrugged, and shook his head.  “We’re talking about you!” I told Brandt. 

I’m always glad when people ask about the FM system.  I much prefer them getting educated about it, instead of just staring and whispering.  I also think it helps to dispel the myth that only ‘old people’ wear hearing aids!

And my whooshing tinnitus is still completely gone, so, I’m back to square one trying to figure out the cause…

  

Meta-Misunderstanding

After my 2,000-word thesis yesterday, I’ll give you something short and light to read today.

When Brandt gets sleepy, he tends to talk about very random things.  On Saturday night, well past midnight, he started randomly talking about someone, but I didn’t recognize the name (he was Earless; my excuse is a lifetime of misunderstandings caused by chronic ear infections as a kid).  The conversation went like this:

Me: “…Who on earth is ‘Biekel Burkett’?!”

Brandt: “‘Eagle Bucket’?!”

Me: “Wait, what name did you say?!”

Brandt: “WHOOPI GOLDBERG.”

Me: “Ooooh Whoopi Goldberg!  Yeah, that’s not what I heard at all!”

Brandt: “I don’t know who ‘Beagle Bartlett’ is…”

It was a misunderstanding of a misunderstanding of a misunderstanding.  That’s got to be a new record!

Shopping Trip Back Home

We’re back from another trip to my hometown (2 hours away) to pick up Brandt’s repaired hearing aid.  He has now had both hearing aids completely rebuilt in less than a year!  His iCom was sent off for repairs (the fifth time) and he was given a loaner.  Then in 6 weeks, Phonak is going to give him their new, updated and upgraded version of the iCom for free—that was the good news.  The bad news was that his Dry and Store hearing aid dryer still hasn’t arrived, 2 months after the clinic ordered it, because there were electronic glitches in the current batch of dryers that have to be repaired.  It’s ALWAYS something!

My mom’s apartment is getting renovated, and she needed help recycling her old computer and picking out a new kitchen light.  That meant a trip to her two least favorite places, Best Buy and Lowe’s, which she calls “big, loud stores for men.” 

Brandt lugged the computer into Best Buy and asked the employee guarding the entrance/exit where the recycling program was.  He pointed us over to Customer Service, and Brandt headed towards it.  He got about 5 feet away when the employee remembered that he needed a sticker for the computer, and yelled at Brandt, which went unheard.  “Sir!  You need a sticker for that computer!” he yelled louder.  No response.  “SIR!” he screamed.  “He can’t hear you!” I said.  I ran over to him, tapped him on the shoulder, and told him he had to go back and get a sticker.  “Why didn’t he tell me that?” Brandt asked.

After unsuccessfully trying to talk my mom into buying a Nintendo Wii and Wii Fit, we headed off to Lowe’s, remembering that we needed a new thermostat for our house in addition to mom’s kitchen light.  There were employees standing at the end of almost every aisle, and each one asked Brandt if he needed help finding anything.  The problem with this was, the store is noisy, with near-constant loudspeakers, paint shakers, lumber cutters, and all the other loud machines whose names and functions I don’t know.  And the tall ceilings and concrete floors certainly don’t help with the acoustics. 

So when Brandt walked by all these helpful employees, he was on a mission to find the thermostats and not paying attention to them.  This means that as he walked through the store, four employees in a row asked if he needed help, and he only responded to one.  The last one looked rather insulted.  My mom and I were walking a few feet behind Brandt pushing the cart, and when the accidental snub happened, the Lowe’s guy looked at me expectantly.  I pointed to my ear, shook my head, and whispered, “He can’t hear you…”  He looked a little embarrassed and nodded, then asked if we needed help finding anything.  By then, two more employees had been ‘ignored’ and I hurried to catch up.

We got to Aisle 15 and there were no thermostats to be found.  “They’re supposed to be on Aisle 15, why aren’t they here?” Brandt asked.  “Are you sure they’re on Aisle 15?” I said.  “That’s what the guy told me back there!”  “Are you sure he said 15?” I asked.  Mom and I had been talking and hadn’t heard him ask anyone.  “I am positive,” he insisted.  Almost immediately, another employee showed up to help, and told us the thermostats were on Aisle 16.  I know it’s possible that the employee told him the wrong aisle, but I have a feeling the problem was with his ears.

Brandt went through the checkout line first, and said he would go get the car cooled off.  As he walked through the exit, he set off the electronic security alarm.  It flashed and beeped, but he had already walked through it and didn’t see or hear it.  Mom was still paying for her light, and we were at least 30 feet away from the exit.  I watched, waiting for someone to politely tap him on the shoulder.  Instead, the employee standing at the self-checkout in front of the exit starting yelling at Brandt to stop, and when he didn’t, the guy called over two other employees.  “Who was it?!” one of them asked.  Several people pointed towards Brandt, and one lady yelled, “The man in the blue shirt!  He just kept walking!”  The three employees all took turns yelling “Sir!  Stop!  You in the blue shirt!  STOP!” 

I was already on my way towards the door, and starting yelling, “Hold on, he’s deaf, I’ll get him!”  They ignored me and kept screaming at him.  “He’s DEAF!  I’ll get him!  He can’t hear you!” I yelled again.  As I walked through the exit, two of the employees started to go after Brandt.  I started running, yelled “HE CAN’T HEAR YOU, I WILL GET HIM!”, and grabbed Brandt by the arm.  He swirled around and asked “What’s wrong?!”, confused at why two employees were running towards him in a panic.  I told him he’d set off the alarm and had to go back inside.  “But, I paid for it,” he said.  “I know, but the alarm got triggered.  Just let them look at the receipt.”  The employees apologized and let him go without any trouble, but there were a dozen pairs of eyes staring widely at us as we walked out of the store.  I really wanted to snap at them, but I stayed silent.

As we walked to the car, my mom whispered to me, “What if that happened with the police?”  I whispered back, “I’m worried about that.  I’ve heard of several cases where Deaf people were tasered and beaten by cops who thought they were resisting arrest.”

It’s times like these that I wish Brandt already had Cochlear Implants...

   

“AND ANTI-POLL GIFT”

I haven’t blogged yet about the mistakes made on television Closed-Captioning, but it happens a lot.  I’ve been writing down my favorite mistakes for a few years now, something I learned from Aunt Louise.  Many many years ago, she kept a notebook next to the television and would write down the funniest errors, but there were so many she finally gave up on keeping a list.

Tonight I was watching The Daily Show, and perked up when Jon Stewart announced that his guest was Spencer Wells, “a Geneticist and an Anthropologist, he’s the Explorer-in-Residence with the National Geographic Society and his new book is called Pandora’s Seed: The Unforeseen Cost of Civilization.”  Since I am an Anthropologist as well, I’m always excited to see ‘our kind’ on television.  Unfortunately, the transcriptionist for Daily Show has trouble with our profession.

The Closed-Captioning (it’s always in ALL-CAPS) introduced Dr. Wells as:

“A DBA NET SIFT AND AND ANTI-POLL GIFT.” 

It was slightly corrected on the next line: “HE IS AN THE ANTHROPOLOGIST,” but it still left out Geneticist and Explorer-in-Residence. 

I know it’s not the transcriptionist’s fault.  Closed-Captioning on television, as well as CART Reporting—Communication Access Realtime Translation—is live (realtime) captioning performed on a stenotype machine.  The transcriptionist does not type in words, but rather syllables that are then translated by a computer program into words.  So if you ever notice that the Closed-Captioning mistakes seem strangely phonetic, it’s because that’s how they were entered!

This wasn’t the first time that my field-of-study was displayed incorrectly on The Daily Show.  Last year, Peter Mancall was on the show promoting his new book Fatal Journey: The Final Expedition of Henry Hudson; he was introduced as a professor of History and “AND TROA POLL DBI.”

Most of the time, the Closed-Captioning mistakes aren’t too bad and can be deciphered.  When Lorelei on Gilmore Girls yells that she is “out of dog TATS” instead of dog treats, you could probably figure it out.  Same with Gary on Early Edition insisting that he loves his “PANTS” instead of his parents—in the context, he was in the middle of talking about his parents, so it’s pretty easy to catch the mistake.

Then there are times when the mistake is extremely confusing.  A few weeks ago, Brandt and I were watching the season finale of How I Met Your Mother, one of our favorite shows.  Lily and Marshall were discussing a cab driver they’d just seen who looked exactly like their friend Barney.  According to the captioning, Lily said,

“The CABBAGES didn’t look enough like Barney.”

Brandt looked at me, confused, and I paused the show.  “Cabbages?  What do cabbages have to do with Barney?” he asked.  “I have no idea…” I said, equally confused.  It really did sound like she’d said “cabbages.”  I hit rewind, listened to it a few times, and finally yelled, “The cabbie just didn’t look enough like Barney”!

Phonetically, it was close.  Logically, it was way off.

  

Love Is...

Brandt and I just got back from a really neat Scottish wedding.  Unfortunately (but not surprisingly), Brandt couldn’t fully appreciate it.  It was an outdoor wedding, and I knew he was going to have a lot of trouble hearing the ceremony.  I tried to get him to sit close to the front, on an aisle seat, so he could possibly hear better, but he didn’t want to take the good seats away from family members (he’s too nice sometimes!)  There was a glimmer of hope when the pastor started out using a microphone, but he quickly discarded it because it was getting in his way and he declared, “I’m loud enough without it!”  No, he wasn’t; not enough.  Brandt missed all the funny moments, looking around confused when everyone in the audience burst into laughter.  I felt so bad for him…

The bride and groom had a handfasting (traditional Scottish practice of tying ribbon or cloth around the couple’s hands), which I have seen on Offbeat Bride but hadn’t seen in person before.  At the end of the ceremony, a man dressed in full Scottish garb surprised us all by playing a bagpipe. 

At the reception, while the bridal party was still taking pictures, we got to play with colored pencils.  Everyone got a sheet of paper with a bunch questions to fill out.  There were basic questions like “How far away did you travel from?,” “How did you meet the bride or groom?,” and “What is your favorite memory of the bride and groom as a couple?”  Brandt and I had fun answering “How many children do you think we will have?” (we said “19”) and “What will their names be?” (we listed 19 types of herbs—Basil, Rosemary, Cinnamon, Peppermint, etc).  For “What is one piece of advice for the newlyweds?,” I said “separate bathrooms!!” and Brandt said “always play Nintendo Wii in cooperative mode only!” 

We had trouble thinking of a funny answer for “Complete the phrase: ‘Love is…’”  All I could come up with was, “Love is SUPER-COOL!”  Brandt has been mis-hearing me a lot lately (more than usual—one of his hearing aids isn’t working right and has to get looked at next week), and today was particularly bad.  So he wrote down,

“Love is… like superglue.”

Then he looked off in the distance, thinking hard about how to explain it, and continued writing.

“It sticks you both together pretty strongly, with an almost unbreakable bond.”

He was very proud of himself, and I was quite impressed that he came up with something so profound based off a misunderstanding.  He told me, “Great suggestion!  That worked out well!”  

  

“Homeless Tequila”

Misunderstandings happen to everyone; they’re a part of life that we generally just deal with, without giving them much thought except for maybe a brief annoyance or chuckle.  However, for people with hearing loss, both the frequency and the frustration of misunderstandings are much greater, often leading to intense embarrassment and even social isolation. 

There are two types of misunderstandings: knowing you didn’t hear it right, and thinking you heard it right when you didn’t.  The second type is much worse, of course, and can cause all sorts of problems.

The worst/best/most memorable misunderstanding Brandt and I have had was about 2 years ago.  (I knew his hearing was getting worse, but “Dr. Smith” kept refusing to test it.)  I asked Brandt an innocent question when I got up one Saturday morning: “Hi honey, how are you?”  A mixture of pain and confusion pulled down his face. 

“Why am I Homeless Tequila?”

he asked in disbelief.  “What—?!” I stammered.  “Why would you call me that?” he continued.  “I would never call you something like that.” 

Another time, Brandt was doing Statistics homework and grumbled to himself.  I asked him, “Why are you grumbling, honey?”  He made a sad, insulted face and said,

“I’m not ugly!”  

I was a little taken aback.  “Of course you’re not ugly, you’re adorable!  I asked why you were GRUMBLING!” “Oh…” he answered, laughing, “I’m grumbling because I’m tired but I have to finish my homework before I can go to bed.  By the way, EARS SUCK!”  I responded, “Apparently!”

A less offending one happened when we were in Brandt’s hometown for his high school reunion.  As we drove by the old school buildings, I asked him, “Does it bring back memories?”  He coughed and asked,

“Does it bring back ovaries?!”

This reminds me of the Sprint PCS commercials from a few years ago that featured “Trench Coat Guy.”  He would appear when bad cellphone service caused hilarious misunderstandings.  In my favorite of the commercials, the wife calls her husband to say, “Get a movie; you know, something old,” but the husband hears, “Get a monkey, with a cold.”  Trench Coat Guy tells the wife, “It’s not his fault, it’s the cellular static.”

In another commercial, the wife asks her husband to bring home shampoo, and instead he brings home the killer whale Shamu.  Trench Coat Guy again explains to the angry wife, “It’s the cellular static.”

This is what we’re dealing with in Brandt’s situation, too—cellular static.  In his case, there are two types of static: the literal, LOUD static that he hears all the time (tinnitus), and the “static” of hearing loss that garbles and muffles what he hears.  Both of these are caused at the cellular level, by his damaged inner-ear hair cells.

The initial reason that I decided we had to learn Sign Language was to help cut down on misunderstandings caused by Brandt’s “cellular static.”  So if he’s about to go grocery shopping and asks me, “Did you say to get grapes or cake?” then I can repeat it with both speech and sign (as soon as I learn more food signs; so far I only know APPLE, POTATO, COOKIE, and MILK).

Another big help for cutting down on misunderstandings, especially when we’re not face-to-face, are e-mails and text messages.  I don’t like having to pay for every text, but they’ve been a huge help!