I love hobbits!
Last in the series of personal essays.
Note I am a special education teacher in a deaf school in Singapore, and the ‘kids’ referred to are my students. :)
***
As I’d said, I used to have an identity crisis.
I was clearly not part of the world around me–the one in which people understand one another effortlessly even though they don’t always face each other when they talk, where they had no problems in group conversations (which was a miracle to me), where they can actually(!) use the telephone and do other oh-so-ordinary everyday stuff which was oh-so-inaccessible to me.
I was ‘different’ because there was something wrong with my ears. I couldn’t hear like other people. I still can’t.
What, then, was I?
*****
I thought I found the answer some years back. In fact, not very far back–perhaps 2 or 3 years ago.
I am Deaf.
With a capital D.
And I am Proud of it.
With a capital P.
For too long, I’ve felt ashamed of my so-called disability. Other ‘normal’ hearing people say so, hence it must be so. That I never knew or saw any other deaf folks only served to reinforce that.
“That’s not a big problem–Learn to lip-read!”
“Pay more attention in class and you will understand the lessons.”
“But you wear hearing aids. Why can’t you hear me?”
“Don’t pretend! You CAN hear me!” (And if I tried to explain that yes, I could hear him but I couldn’t understand his speech, it only made things worse: “Huh?? Can hear me but can’t understand me?? You dunno English??!”)
And so on.
The nonsense accumulated. And I willingly took it all in.
I tried so hard and so intensely to be a Hearing person. (And yes, I make no apologies for the capital H.)
And it was all in vain, a futile effort doomed to failure from the very start, simply because I never was one to begin with and I never could be one. Ever.
But I don’t aspire to be a Hearing person anymore.
Does that sound weird?
Why?
Oh sure, it IS a disability, but only as far as I allow it to be.
I’ve stated before that I don’t care what label people want to pin on me, and I’ve been stuck with numerous labels through the years–hearing-impaired (the most common tag, used by doctors, teachers and relatives), hard-of-hearing, have hearing loss, have hearing problem, deaf (small ‘d’, as a form of mockery by certain people) and half-half (the “h-h” sign favoured by some Deaf people to refer to those whom they see as ‘in-between’ hearing and deaf).
And I don’t bloody give a dam.
Go ahead, feel free. It’s your right to call me whatever you want.
As long as you understand the bottomline: I am functionally deaf.
I am functionally deaf with or without my hearing aids.
I am functionally deaf even with my good speech. (Since when has good speech got to do with deafness anyway?)
All that debate over my status can be distilled to this one simple fact: I am functionally deaf.
And if you ask me, that is, if anyone bothers to ask me my opinion of my own status (assuming s/he is interested in my opinion of MYSELF, instead of being busy stating their opinions about MY condition), I say: I am Deaf.
Of course, even this assertion wasn’t to be allowed to pass without challenge, from both the Hearing and Deaf worlds.
Some Hearing and even Deaf people objected, “You can’t be deaf! You speak soooooo well! You have excellent speech!”
Some Deaf people think: No way, he is oral. No way, he is half-half. No way, he doesn’t understand Deaf Culture cos he isn’t from our community. And so on.
So I took in a lot of rubbish from these camps too.
Man, I should’ve been a rubbish collector. (No offence to rubbish collectors.)
But some short people, let’s call them hobbits, saved the world from being overran by rubbish-spewing human grown-ups.
My kids, erm, I mean, some hobbits, took the position that I am Hearing or H-H at first.
Gradually, the months passed, and….
… they saw my hearing aids (when I did use them, and which were so such more inconspicious than theirs),
… my ability to understand their rapid-fire signs, my willingness to dump SEE and code-switch to their signing style and structure (ahem, officially not allowed.. so please, shhhhh.. I’d have tried anything to make them understand my lessons and anyway that’s the Total Communication philosophy after all),
….the ‘deaf characteristics’ I shared with them (like, whenever hearing colleagues called me from the door while my back was turned, the hobbits always had to tell me cos I inevitably failed to react) and…
… the times they were ever-eager to tell me it was “recess!” when the bell went and I happened not to be wearing my aids.
Me: “Is it? But it’s still 9.55.”
“Clock slow! You didn’t hear bell?? Recess now!”
Me (teasingly): “Oh. Of course I heard it. I’m hearing.”
“NOOOO!! YOU ARE DEAF!!!”
I’m still not sure if they know the distinction between Deaf and deaf.
But I know they now see me as deaf, just like them.
Perhaps that’s all that matters.
Hooray for hobbits!
