The Night I Didn’t Go Deaf
That very day, the topic of hearing had come up briefly in a conversation with a friend. It’s significant that this was a real conversation, with actual audible sound, unlike most of my conversations these days, which occur via some variation of the written word.
That oral exchange assured me that my sudden loss of sound perception was recent, within the past few hours. However, that was small consolation when I was faced with the prospect of radically diminished hearing.
The problem came to my attention when I tried to play a Facebook video. Well, the video was playing, but the sound was barely perceptible. I tried another video, with only slightly better results. I could make out the words only if I held the phone to my ear.
I pulled up a song and discovered the problem was not limited to Facebook. I was getting worried now. Of course I checked all the volume settings on my phone, but I found no problem with them.
I paused and listened to my surroundings. The only sound was the whir of the fan from an air purifier a few feet away. I was encouraged that I could hear it, but that was white noise, not distinct words or musical tones. I contemplated the prospect of living the remainder of my life with the level of hearing I was then experiencing, and I felt a wave of sadness start to rise.
It might be worth mentioning that I wasn’t fully awake at this point. Other sources of sound were either physically out of reach or simply didn’t come to mind at the time. But after several minutes of fiddling with my phone, it finally occurred to me to speak out loud to myself.
When I did, I felt a guarded relief at the sound of my own voice. My relief was guarded because my mind said that the sound of my voice MIGHT be resonating through the bones of my head (not that I’m a bone head—don’t go there) rather than being perceived in the way outside sounds are transmitted. Wait, doesn’t all hearing involve the resonance of bones inside the head? Oh, never mind. In any case, I still hungered for further reassurance.
I looked toward my resting cat, who inconsiderately refused to speak a word in my moment of need.
As a last-ditch, middle-of-the-night chance, I turned my phone off and on again. I went back to a random music channel and discovered…YES! My hearing had been miraculously restored.
Thank you God for delivering me from the loss of something I value even more today than yesterday. And thank you Beyonce for delivering the melodious news that my hearing is still blessedly intact.
Most days it doesn’t even occur to me to play music while I work. But today, I’m listening to some music and celebrating the gift of beautiful noise.