Wednesday's Words for July 20, 2011

I recall a conversation I had with my beloved several years ago. We were discussing the fact that he was becoming deaf—the result of working at an open pit mine without benefit of hearing protection for too many years. This was back before his site was purchased by the large international firm that owns it today.

At the time he was adamant, of course, that he didn’t need hearing aids. “Those things don’t work, anyway. All they do is make everything louder so that all you hear is loud static.”

Still, I had said, he should look into getting them. He said he would, as soon as hell froze over.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I have an announcement to make. Hell has, apparently, frozen over.

This past Saturday my husband took delivery of his first set of hearing aids. He began the process to get them back in January, at the request of his employer. They suggested he go through the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, a provincial government agency. This agency will provide equipment such as hearing aids if the damage suffered is work related.

So at the beginning of the year he went to get his hearing tested and was told, very frankly, that he was so hearing impaired as to be considered disabled.

This came as a surprise to no one but him.

One thing I can say about my beloved: he isn’t a man to believe something just because someone tells him so.

Or even if several someones do.

Needless to say there have been loads of improvements to hearing aid technology since the “olden days” when his uncle got one (I believe in was in the 1960s and that was what my DH was basing his opinion on).

He got the call to go in last Saturday, and when he came out of the building, he was wearing a couple of very small pieces of ultra-modern technology.

Aside from being light weight, they came with a “remote control” device. He immediately pointed the device at me and said, “I can turn you off, now.”

Congratulate me, I held my tongue.

He said they were comfortable, and that was good. We went home, and he went out to sit on the porch. Our front porch, that faces this very quiet street in our fairly small town, has always been a good place to sit. Dozens of trees line the street. Trees, of course, are the homes of birds.

On our street, the trees house hundreds of birds, at times.

“Good Lord, are they always so noisy?” DH asked. I just grinned.
He took the dog for a walk, and when he returned, he said, “I didn’t realize how much I didn’t hear until I got these.”

Again, I guarded my tongue. I like to think that, at my age, the need to say, “I told you so” has faded—that I’m mature enough to just let it go.

Yes, I’d like to think that, but I’m not sure I’m really strong enough to resist the temptation forever.

Love,
Morgan
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury
http://wednesdayswordsbymorgan.blogspot.com/