By Liane Kupferberg Carter December 18 at 8:00 AM (Washington Post)
My husband, Marc, and I celebrated our 35th anniversary this year. Did we mark the milestone by scuba diving off the Great Barrier Reef? Zip-lining through the rain forest in Costa Rica? Rafting the Colorado River?
Nope, nope and nope.
We got His and Hers hearing aids.
I’m 62; he’s 64. Our lifelong love of rock concerts, cranked-up stereos and bass-heavy boomboxes has taken its toll. For the past year we’ve been having too many Emily Litella moments. Recently we were driving past a row of new houses when Marc said, “Look at all the silver towels.”
I craned my head. “What?” He pointed. “Right there.”
I looked for laundry flapping in the breeze. “Where?”
“There.”
“WHERE?”
Annoyed, he waved at the roofs. “Right there!” he shouted. “Don’t you see the solar panels?”
Oh. Never mind.
Hearing aids are now a boon to us both at work. Conference calls and meetings are easier to navigate and less fatiguing.
Ambient noise in restaurants has become less challenging. While our dinner companions whip out smartphones to show off photos of new grandkids, we discreetly pull out our iPhones to adjust for voice direction, noise reduction and wind rustle.
Hearing aids aren’t perfect. As good as they are, they can’t fully replace what you’ve lost. We still have moments. Even though I know Creedence Clearwater Revival is singing, “There’s a bad moon on the rise,” lately it sounds suspiciously like “There’s a bathroom on the right.”
Or maybe it just indicates a whole different problem.