My Melting Heart

We last saw Eliza at Christmas time, when she was 13 months old. At 21 months old, she is bubbly, bouncy, and verbal. When she first saw me last week and said, “Hi, Oma!” in a high and clear soprano voice, my heart melted.

We had our annual Summer Retreat: a week dedicated to our immediate family. Eliza won my heart; Andrew, age 6, and Victoria, just turned 4, already had. Several months ago, an older friend of mine said, "Grandchildren just melt your heart." I agreed that grandchildren are wonderful (“If I’d known grandkids were so much fun, I would have started with them” quips a tee shirt), but this week I experienced what she was expressing on a deep level. It’s an astonishing thing, to be accepted fully and without reservation by a tiny human being.

I love Victoria and Andrew; our relationships are more complex, in good ways. We can tell jokes and tease and talk about how things work. Andrew is teaching me how to play Pokemon, a game I ignored when his uncle was young and enthusiastic about it. Victoria and I play with kinetic sand and read stories.

Eliza is endearing as only a one-year-old can be. The freshness, the little personality in a pint-sized body: every encounter is magical.

When Victoria was this age, I visited them in New York. She returned from an afternoon doctor’s appointment and came into the living room; she saw me and ran to me, arms outstretched. The love of a child is deeply healing. The love of three is beyond measure.

Hearing aid (singular)

A dozen days ago I took a leap and bought a hearing aid at Costco. Yes, singular. Since high school, my left ear hasn’t heard as well as my right. It has gradually gotten worse. Three years ago I had mild loss; now it is moderate. When I told my daughter, R’el, that I was getting just one, she said, “Classic under-buyer”, the terminology Gretchen Rubin uses in describing personal styles and preferences. Yup, that’s me. (Though I just looked at her Over-buyer/Under-buyer Quiz and she doesn't describe me at all: I have a basement full of storage items: soap, shaving cream, food: things I use; no late-night trips to the store for me. I do consciously put off purchases and cut corners, like buying just one hearing aid.

After the fitting, as I walked through Costco, the aisles seemed noisier and more crowded, though they weren't. As my brain adjusts to the new input, I notice it less and less.

In Portsmouth, NH, after we passed a couple on the sidewalk, I could still hear their voices deep in my ear. I felt like a spy with a covert listening device. Last week in the temple, I could hear a whispered conversation behind me. I turned around, expecting they were just behind my chair, but they were across the large room. It felt like eavesdropping.

Buying a hearing aid is a rite of passage. I’m definitely in my  60s now. I’ve worn trifocals for about 12 years and didn’t feel any reluctance to start, in fact, I asked for them: being able to read anything instantly, without searching for my ‘cheaters’ and getting them on my nose, is more important than looking young. 

Trifocals don’t make me feel old; a hearing aid does. Maybe that’s part of the reason I only got one: makes me half as old, right? I discovered that my hairstyle makes the aid is nearly invisible (though I’m blowing my cover now, aren’t I?). Completely accidental, but I’m quite pleased. I will probably ask my hairdresser to keep the style.

When a nurse sticks an otoscope in my ear, I have to concentrate on relaxation breathing. I've heard some people enjoy the sensation (do you?), but for me it’s barely tolerable. The worst part of getting fitted was that the audiologist had to put thin probe tube in my ear to verify the effectiveness of the aid. I made it worse by cringing: she had to adjust it three times.

So much of interpersonal communication is by voice: I have felt isolation as I've lost my hearing. I’m grateful for the improvement.