It happened again. This time I was at Home Depot, off in my own world looking at seed packets and dreaming about working in my butterfly garden this summer.
“Excuse me!”
I look up. A young woman with a clip board in hand smiles. “I’d like to ask you some questions. It will only take a minute. Can you tell me which room you plan to remodel next? Your bathroom or kitchen?”
“I’m not planning to remodel anything. Thanks.” I try to turn back to the seeds, but notice her staring at me, jaw agape.
“Not planning to remodel?!” she looks aghast as if I just told her I wasn’t planning to brush my hair ever again.
“Well,” she continues, “we’d like to send someone to your home, a decorator. You see many people think they aren’t planning to remodel, but after they see our decorators, they remember they want to remodel something. . .”
“Uh– well no thanks, I’m not interested in having a decorator out to my home.” I turn again, frustrated now that my summer reverie has been spoiled.
“Where are you from, anyway?” she asks.
“FROM?!” I hesitate. I know what’s coming next. “I’m from here.”
“No. . . I mean where are you FFRROMM??” Emphasis added. She’s certain I am not from here, or haven’t always been from here, or something.
(OK, OK– It’s true I was born in the midwest, but I moved to the Seattle area by age nine, and dropped the mild midwestern twang by age ten. No one has asked where I was from until the past few years when my hearing dipped into the severe-profound ranges.)
“I grew up just north of Seattle,” I say.
“OH!” she says in surprise, “You sound . . . different. . . like you have some kind of accent. . .” Her eyes squint suspiciously.
“Yeh– that’s because I’m practically deaf. I’m reading your lips.”
“OH MY GOD!” she exclaims, “That’s so COOL!”
(Riiight– I really, really wish she would go away now. I’m getting annoyed.) I stare over my glasses with my best ‘are-we-done-here?’ look.
This kind of thing happens just often enough that it bugs me, but not so often that it doesn’t catch me by surprise each and every time. I know I sound a little different. I can accept that. It’s part and parcel of being deaf. I do not mind being different. My hearing isn’t the only area where I stray from the norm. I could probably think of at least fifty ways I differ from others.
I turn back to the seeds.
And then it hits me. . . How boring gardens would be if all flowers were exactly the same.
Happy Almost Spring! 
