My custom each morning is to sit on a concrete bench outside at dawn and look up to see if I can spot any morning stars. Rarely do I sit outside in silence. As the sky lightens, birds chirp away, and I welcome their song. With a morning breeze the trees make the softest sigh. But when the wind is up, the woods rustle.
Lately I’ve walked outside to silence. The trees have stood absolutely still, and I wonder how those topmost leaves don’t sway just a bit. Birds are silent. Why are they sleeping in?
Then I check my left ear. Did I put in my hearing aid? Years ago, an older friend commented that he couldn’t hear birdsong. His hearing had deteriorated so high-pitched sounds were invisible to him (which usually included my voice). He said he could no longer hear birds.
Not hear birds? That’s not right.
It took a while to convince him that he was missing a bit of joy, and don’t we all need every bit of that we can find?
If I didn’t wear my glasses, I couldn’t read a page in a book or a computer screen. Glasses changed my life when I was in fifth grade and couldn’t copy from the blackboard without walking to the front of the classroom. What a stunner to get those first glasses and see leaves on trees. I kept lifting them up to see the difference with and without. Had other people always seen what was now a whole new world to me?
I view my hearing aid the same way. Do others hear the TV with the sound on level 18? Some nights, I’ve taken my hearing aid out and then watched TV. The next time I turn it on, it blasts me at 47. In my defense, I rarely watch live TV, and the recorded shows seem to have a lower volume, so I keep pushing that little up arrow.
I have one ear that’s doing its job without help, but the left one has a too narrow channel. I failed the hearing test by not hearing a word correctly. The problem is I grab a word that sounds close in sound, and believe me, that can change a whole conversation. Or I say the dreaded, “What? Repeat that. I didn’t catch it.” And that can really become annoying. Just ask our sons.
It’s been my experience that men have a harder time adjusting to hearing aids than women. But we all know their brains are wired just a little bit differently. (That’s a huge topic that I could devote years to since I’ve been surrounded by them–three brothers, husband, three sons).
Really, this is not a paid commercial, but if you discover you aren’t hearing delightful birdsong, have your ears tested. We all need the joy of birds singing in the background of our lives.
