Deaf Girly and the sirens

A few weeks ago I wrote about blog about the fire alarm at work and how, when it went off, I couldn't hear it but that everything around me sounded muffled and quieter.

It was a new thing I've noticed, and I found it kinda fascinating.

Anyway, last night FJM and I were walking back from the gym. It was quite late and the roads were fairly quiet. There were no loud, low buses thundering by for me to hear. As far as I was concerned, there was no noise.

So imagine my surprise when FJM, who was mid-sentence, started yelling at me. Not yelling in a mad way, but yelling the rest of the sentence that five seconds previously, he'd be saying at a normal level.

'Why are you shouting,' I asked him, a small part of me secretly hoping that by some miracle I'd got my hearing back and he wasn't shouting at all. 'What?' he yelled. So I repeated myself, but shouted this time, and he gestured to a police car hurtling by. The lights were flashing but to me it made no sound.

'I was yelling,' FJM explained after it had vanished into the distance, 'because that thing was making such a noise.'

'Not to me it wasn't,' I replied, laughing at the absurdity of the situation. I mean, it's kind of brilliant and weird all at the same time when you think about it. I can hear better in high-frequency noisy situations, because I don't hear those high frequency noises. So on Saturdays in busy cafés filled with screaming children, people don't have to raise their voice to speak to me at all. In my ears, the children are not there.

And the same with sirens. They don't alter what I hear at all. Amazing huh?

A small part of me loves that there are situations when I can hear better than hearing people. I love that my ears, while not working brilliantly most of the time, are able to block out the most antisocial of noises. Sirens, alarms, kids. That even if all hell breaks loose on the road outside our flat at 2am and there are police everywhere (it has happened before) I will be a regular sleeping beauty(?) blissfully unaware.

And on that lovely and thankful note, happy weekend peeps.

DG