Audism Experiment Wrap-Up

Hello everyone,

It's been a couple of weeks, and I received a few responses from you out there to help me with Audism Experiment #4. So let's get these results out of the way. The labels attached to this group were;

- American Sign Language
- CODA
- Culturally Deaf
- Deaf
- Deaf Clubs
- Deaf Community
- Deaf Culture

Here are the screen shots of what I just viewed on this particular post;

So from my end, I did not get a single ad related to anything Deaf, deaf, or to Audism. Huhhhhh? I don't know either. It kind of feels like a fluke or something. Now here are the results from you all;

- Audi A6 limousine lease
- Concept map software
- Audi rss A5 and SS Felgen
- Auto online
- Audi A3
- Car insurance
- 2012 Hearing Aid Guide
- Med El Cochlear Implants
- Middle ear implant
- Sign Language Games
- 5 signs of depression
- Songbird Hearing Aids
- Free disability screening
- Disability
- Hearing Aid Deals

Now this is more to what I expected based on what I had seen in the previous three experiments. Because of this, I am going to call my screen shots for this experiment a fluke.

On the overall, I'd have to say that I could see the pattern of Audism in Google AdSense advertising quite clearly. Certainly not every ad was audist, but there were more ads promoting Audism than there were showing Deaf Culture in a positive and/or neutral light. Lets get some numbers here to back this finding up.

54 of 130 ads were directly related to hearing aids, cochlear implants, hearing loss, and disabilities.That's 42% of the advertising.

11 of 130 ads were for something either positive or neutrally related to the Deaf Community and culture. That's just a mere 8% of the advertising.

The rest of the ads were not related to either Audism or Deaf. We could say that all the Audi ads were related by their spelling and AdSense's auto-pairing/matching things up by label (even if it's only the fist 4 letters that match up in the word 'Audism'). There were 8 ads of the 130, for a 6% share. I find that sad that there were almost as many ads for Audi as there were for Deaf Culture. But at least that's not a sign of Audism.

I think the findings speak for themselves, and has led me to the conclusion that AdSense is promoting Audism on my blog! This is not something that sits well with me. It was very tough to see these ads on the blog over the last month, so this is what I will do;

I plan to go into my AdSense settings and begin to block all of these ads. I have a feeling that this will be a long, drawn out, and perhaps even slightly continuous process because I have to block them by web address. It's inevitable that new sites will pop up, etc, etc. This will take some time. I have however, earned about enough money to buy myself a lunch at a sub-shop. It's not a lot, but it's enough for me to say I want to keep AdSense. Any amount of financial support I can get from the time I put into the blog is nice, but I do not wish to earn anything off of Audism related advertising, and that's the key for me. If I can get these audist ads off of the page, or even at a bare minimum, then I think this is how I plan to proceed.

Agree with me, or don't agree with me. Either way, I would love to know what all of you think of this plan. Is this a good or bad idea in your eyes?

Until next time,

R. M.

Response to the TSA

Hello everyone,

First, I would like to update you all. There were 2 comments on my blog post "Audism Experiment #4", which had told me I have been nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award, and the Leibster Blog Award. Awards? Hey, that's fantastic, until I go to check them out, that is......

Turns out both awards also require me to answer some "get to know you" questions, and then ask some of others. Both awards ask me to nominate another 11 blogs. Now, to me, this is starting to seem like it's along the lines of those old 'chain emails' or something else so silly.

Please do not get me wrong, I had to be nominated by other bloggers just like me, which means I must have done something to their liking in order to be nominated by them. Let's hope so, at least. If that is really the case, then I would like to thank Divya Bisht and Erleen Alvarez for their nominating me. On the overall, though, it kind of feels like empty, like anyone could have gotten this, and it makes me feel as though placing a lot of emphasis on this feels lackluster. Again, Erleen and Divya, thank you, but I'd rather not participate.

With that out of the way, what i want to talk about today is the TSA, or the Transportation Security Administration. Recently in Kentucky there was a National Association of the Deaf (NAD) convention held. One of the Deaf people in attendance decided to blog about how poorly he was treated by the TSA at the SDF airport in Louisville. Apparently TSA officers teased and mocked him for being Deaf, and confiscated his candy, then ate it in front of him. There were some other things that allegedly happened as well.

As you an imagine, many Deaf people are upset about this. Deaf people are very sensitive to Audism because they experience it all the time, and to them this incident is just another example of how cruel hearing people can be towards them. Well, the TSA responded with their own blog. Here's the link to see for yourself;

http://blog.tsa.gov/2012/07/alleged-mistreatment-of-passenger-who.html

Given the circumstances of what both sides are saying, I have no idea if one side or the other is being completely honest about this incident, and will not comment on that matter. What I'd like to point out is something I can actually see has happened, and that is something the TSA said in their blog response.

"When TSA found out the NAD conference was coming to Louisville, TSA reached out to NAD and other members of its disability coalition while Transportation Security Officers at SDF received additional training on screening deaf passengers from local experts in the field."

What bothers me is what I've highlighted in red. The term "disability coalition". Here's is just another example of Audism at its most ignorant. A government agency referring to Deaf people as 'disabled' is a huge error in characterization. Who knows what really happened to this Deaf passenger, but I can tell you I find it very difficult to fully believe someone or some group who claims to be fair and just when they can't even give culturally deaf people the respect they deserve by referring to them as 'disabled'. I find this incredibly reprehensible and ignorant.

Not only that, but the TSA, who stated that "officers at SDF received additional training on screening deaf passengers from local experts in the field", couldn't even come away from such additional training without the knowledge that Deaf people do not consider themselves to be 'disabled'? At the very least, it appears that the TSA is not being very honest. I'm pretty sure that any local expert on culturally deaf people would have stressed this point in their training sessions. If they can't even show respect in their response, then how am I or anyone else to believe what they are saying is true? They've already done something oppressive by leading everyone to believe that Deaf people are 'disabled'. What I cannot determine is that whether this is an act of Audism in the name of ignorance or apathy. Neither one sits well for me, especially from an agency that should be showing 100 percent professionalism at all times. It's a government agency, representative of our appointed leaders and also of ourselves. My tax money just went to that? Unbelievable.

Don't get me wrong. I want extra security at airports for I never want to bear witness to another version of 9/11 again, but it can be done with more respect and professionalism than this. To me this is just another example of how deep and pervasive Audism is in this country. It is so low on TSA's radar that they couldn't even make an appropriate reference to the Deaf community. It looks bad on them and makes me wonder what it is truly like for the average Deaf person who attempts to pass security points at airports all over this country. The TSA hasn't convinced me of their ability to do so with respect and professionalism. Perhaps they need some agency-wide trainings from the top levels down to their lowest ranking employees on Deaf culture and respect. If they truly conducted themselves they way they claimed to have at SDF concerning the incident in question, then the least they could do is hire someone who would respect the Deaf community enough to learn a little bit about them before making such a reference. Instead, they allow Bob Burns of the TSA Blog Team to represent them.

Soon to come will be the final results in the "Audism Experiment" series.

Until next time,

R. M.

Audism Experiment #4

Hello everyone,

The response I got from all of you for Audism Experiment #3 was better than any so far. Granted, I may have given it a few more days in between, but you all did this. Many thanks. Experiment #3 had no labels attached to it, so what I expected was nothing related to Deaf, deafness, Audism, etc etc. Here's the breakdown of what you all reported to me;

- 10 Car Sales Ads, 3 of them from Audi
-   2 Interpreter Positions
-   6 For Post Secondary Education
- 12 For Hearing Aids and/or Batteries
-   2 For Law Firms
-   1 Deaf Personals
-   2 Sensorineural Hearing Loss
-   2 Cochlear Implants
-   1 AARP ????? (Seniors and hearing loss? It's a stretch, at best...)
-   1 Psychology Experiment
-   1 Self Selection Research
-   1 For Stahlflex (That's a German company, btw. How much does that rock?)
-   1 Brain Training Games
-   1 Google Chrome
-   1 Concept Map Software (I don't believe that's related to CI mapping)
-   1 Disabled help with Scooters
-   1 New Google + Events
-   1 Mobile Web
-   1 Mobile Phone
-   1 For Cisco

Wow! What data! So what is Audism related here? 16 of 49 ads were. That's more than coincidence for me. But it shows that Adsense is doing more than just relating content to labels. Basing this on past posts, perhaps? That would be my guess. Here's some snapshots of what I saw when I viewed the page;

 Doesn't look too bad, eh? Nothing related, except for that Audi ad, hehe. I went back on a second time just because, and this is what I got;

What what what? This throws everything off! Every single ad is related to Deaf, and 9 of can be considered Audistic! Man, just my luck to look a second time. Way to go, Google...

Now for the final test of Adsense, Experiment #4. This will have labels related only to the Deaf community in a positive way. Here's what I will go with;

- Deaf
- Deaf Culture
- Deaf Community
- Deaf Clubs
- CODA
- Culturally Deaf
- American Sign Language

So let's give this a week or so and we will then be able to compare everything. I think that those of us who have experience with Deaf people know how this last experiment will turn out, too. This experiment had such a great response from you all, and I hope you continue on this one, so tell me every ad you see - PLEASE! :)

Until next time,

R. M.

Book Review - The Grimoire: Lichgates by S. M. Boyce

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12900806-the-grimoire

Hello Everyone,

Another book read, and time for another review. The book is The Grimoire: Lichgates, by author S. M. Boyce. Here's a description from the book's page on goodreads.com.

"The Grimoire turns its own pages and can answer any question asked of it, and Kara Magari is its next target. She has no idea what she's getting herself into when she stumbles across the old book while hiking a hidden trail. Once she opens it, she's thrown into Ourea: a beautiful world full of terrifying things that all want the Grimoire's secrets. Everyone in this new world is trying to find her, and most want to control her.

Braeden Drakonin grew up in Ourea, and all he’s ever known of life is lying. The Grimoire is his one chance at redemption, and it lands in his lap when Kara Magari comes into his life. He has one question to ask the book – one question that can fix everything in his broken life – and he’s not letting Kara out of his sight until he gets an answer.

There’s no escaping Ourea. There’s no going back now."

Ok. So here's what I think of the book. It left me feeling a bit bipolar, so bear with me cause it will get better. 

The title and genre got me excited. I love fantasy books about magic and medieval stuff, different worlds, all of that is great. I was incredibly let down by the beginning of the book. To be completely honest, if I was not reading this book to give the author a review, I don't believe I would have gotten through the beginning. For me, it was that bad. It took no time whatsoever for Kara to find herself in the midst of all the action. I'll admit that sometimes action happening right away in a story is good, and that could have happened here, too, if the author had expanded on Kara's background more. Here was someone who was obviously the main character of the story, and before I could create any bond with her, she fell through the lichgate and into the new world of Ourea, and became the Vagabond. On top of that the author's descriptives in the story were just kind of 'blah' and not really polished. What I really wanted was to know more about her troubled past and how it affected her. I never got a real sense of that in the beginning of the book, and it left me not wanting to root for her right away. Another way I can describe it is by the movie Labyrinth, starring Jennifer Connelly and David Bowie. I love Jim Henson stuff and I expect it to not get too crazy into a plot line. Connelly is thrown into the mix right away as a result, which works for the movie, but not in a book. At least not for me, anyway.


So leave that aside, because I did continue on. As the book went forward the world of Ourea opened up to me. I liked a lot of it, and it was enough that I was able to ignore the author's use of descriptives and sometimes cheesy dialogue (kind of like what you would hear on Hercules or Xena). The blood loyalty within the races of Yakona was something I found fascinating. A lot can be done with that, and my mind wandered as I explored all the possibilities. Along the way the author finally expanded on Kara's background and how the loss of her mother affected her. If more had been done on that at the beginning of the book, I would have liked it. So now I get to know her more, and now i want to root for her. 

The Drenowith, or Muses, were a fairly cool addition to the world as well, and their importance in the story is evident from the moment they were introduced. That being said, I felt there were some other areas that could have been stronger. The story lacked some minor details in the lands where Kara visited. All of them had a decent start to help my imagination out, but a little more time on it could have made it a lot better. Her storyline of the impending war was great for me, and I have to admit the book began to grow on me without me realizing it. I even noticed as I was reading towards the end of the book that the writing style I did not like in the beginning had changed into something stronger. It was slight, but it was there, and I can say now that I will read the next book in the series. It's almost as if I was witnessing the author mature as a writer with each chapter. I am glad I stuck it out to the end.

Despite the book's four star ending, the beginning nearly ruined the whole thing for me. I cannot in good conscience give this book even three and a half stars. It has to be three stars, which is 'ok' in my book. I do want to give it a little plus beyond the three - a kind of footnote that reads, "I believe this series is going to be way better than my rating of this first book would indicate." 

So there you have it, 3+ (the plus is not a half a star) stars for The Grimoire: Lichgates. S. M. Boyce, towards the end of the book you showed a lot more focus and it pulled me in. I have a positive feeling in my gut that you will not disappoint in the upcoming sequel. I will be waiting.

Click the captioned link under the picture above to find the book's page on Goodreads.com. From there you should be able to find out how to obtain your own copy. Happy reading everyone!

Until next time, 

R. M.

Help Stop Audism Right Now!

Hello to everyone,

I want to point out the recently added widget that you should see to the right on this page. It is a link to sign a petition against author Kristin Henson and the involved publishing companies for publishing the book "Super Smutty Sign Language". What sounds like having fun with ASL has turned out to be a really bad idea for Henson.

This was something I had read about on Facebook through several people in the Deaf community. Apparently, Henson is a hearing person who has only taken a couple of beginner ASL courses, and is now suddenly ready to publish this book. How would you like it if you were Chinese and some random American who took a beginning Chinese language course decided to make a book about teaching Super Smutty Chinese, as if they had any credentials to do so? This is right there as another example of Audism. Let me explain;

We define Audism as "The notion that one is superior based on one's ability to hear or to behave in the manner of one who hears."(Thank you Tom Humphries) If you ask me, only knowing some very basic, and I mean VERY basic ASL does not grant you the right to go ahead and make money off of your limited knowledge. It's a bug snub to Deaf people, and many that I know are not happy about this. It's a hearing person with no real tie to the Deaf community or no identity within the community (by that, I mean CODAs and some ASL interpreters, etc) making money off of something very central to it. Earning a profit for this is absolutely waving the flag of Audism in all of our faces.

Many Deaf people began to respond with their own comments on this website, http://truebizme.com/2012/06/28/action-alert-hearing-person-exploiting-asl-for-profit/ . You can click the link and go see for yourselves if you'd like. In fact, I encourage you to do just that. Here is one comment that I find explains this far better than I ever could;

    

dagrushkin said:

June 28, 2012 at 9:25 pm

Thank you for the contact info, Octavian. This is what I sent:
Dear Editors:
I am an Associate Professor of American Sign Language (ASL) and Deaf Studies at the California State University – Sacramento.  I am Deaf and have been an ASL speaker for more than 30 years.  
I was appalled to find out today that not only is Kristen Henson doing her “sign language” instructional videos on You Tube, she is now in the process of having a book published of her highly dubious work through your publishing company.  I urge you strongly to discontinue any plans to publish this book, which the Deaf community finds extremely demeaning, for a number of reasons, which I will enumerate below:
First, Kristen is NOT a fluent, competent signer.  In watching her videos, it is immediately evident that she not only produces a number of formational/articulatory errors, but she is also often grammatically incorrect as well.  As anyone knows, if you are going to teach a language, it should be taught correctly, and preferably by native models, which Kristen is not, by any definition. 
Second, the “sign language” that she is teaching has no practical use for any sort of regular contact with Deaf people. Random sentences of a sexual or stereotypical nature are not how one typically initiates contact with a Deaf person.  Moreover, were someone to use these phrases with a new acquaintance, if they were not immediately slapped or punched, they would not understand anything that was signed back to them, since they obviously would not have learned any form of normal discourse. 
Third, ASL has had a long history of being banned, dismissed, diminished and in general, disrespected by professionals and lay people alike.  To produce a series of ungrammatical and articulatorily incorrect videos (let alone a book filled with the same) perpetuates the notion that ASL is not a language deserving of respect and that where ASL is concerned, any sort of movement of the hands means that one  is using “ASL”, when this is clearly not the case. 
Moreover, the Deaf community has had a long history of Hearing people profiting off not only our bodies, but also our language.  Kristen Henson is just the latest of such profiteers, and it is doubly insulting that there are many highly qualified, competent, Deaf people who are not being offered any sort of lucrative publishing deals, while a person like Kristen, without any training or cultural understanding, is being endorsed by your company.  
I am sure that there are some who may think that Kristen Henson’s work is intended in a humorous vein.  However, given the history of disparagement of ASL, any such humor is immediately lost and instead it becomes yet another example of belittlement  of a culture, people, and language.  I am sure that many other cultural and linguistic groups would also find it insulting to have a non-native speaker publish work in their language consisting solely of sexual, racial and stereotypical concepts. 
I could go on, but I think you get the basic idea here.  Kristen Henson’s work is highly offensive, inappropriate, and should not be financially or otherwise rewarded by your company or anyone else.  So once again, I urge you to immediately take action and discontinue any plans to publish this (or any similar) work. 
Donald A. Grushkin, Ph.D.

Here is a dialogue between two people in the comments section. I think it's important to show this as well so you can all see differing points of view;

    

JJ said:

June 29, 2012 at 8:50 am

I was born deaf – i think youre all over reacting. If you dont like it….write your own stupid book. Some of these long winded and asinine comments about culture and blah blah blah just makes you look ignorant. You dont like a book…shut up and get another one. I quit using sign language because youre all too obsessed on controlling how its used in your “culture”. You wont use it like a language but more like abbreviated yoda…which NO ONE talks like in real life, books, or tv. Youre all just LAZY not to use complete sentences. But you will raise a stink over what is free speech farce comedy.

• 
  Tavian said:

  June 29, 2012 at 8:54 am

  You are entitled to your opinion. You might want to take some time to educate yourself on the real issues at hand: cultural appropriation, exploitation, systems of power and privilege, oppression, and the content which is racist and sexist. Along with linguistic research in ASL.
  
• 
  JJ said:

  June 29, 2012 at 8:56 am

  oh, how did i “quit” sign language…i got a cochlear implant…wow oh wow how awesome it works…and the so called “community” is offended and determines that i couldnt accept myself or some stupid thing like that. The fact is…no one should be blind, deaf, or anything…but a lot of deaf people i meet are so anti technology or enhancement but its ok to use their pda, chatbox, videobox, or any of that…but God forbid i try to hear things, speak orally, and not use sign language.I thought i should clear that comment up.
  
  • 
    Tavian said:

    June 29, 2012 at 9:01 am

    JJ,
    I have no problem with Cochlear Implants. I understand your decision to get one and respect your right to get one. It is unfortunate that you feel you cannot remain a member of the deaf community despite having a CI. Attitudes are changing. I wrote a blog post about my feelings about Cochlear Implants last year and got a lot of positive feedback. The general sense is the real problem is language and education deprivation that accompanies the decision to give a child a CI at an early age without a guarantee that it works and without a guarantee that the child will learn language, become independent, and economically self-sufficient.
    

JJ said:

June 29, 2012 at 9:03 am

Tavian, Educate myself? Are you FKN kidding me? – This whole setup of how the deaf community believes it should function in terms of how to react to polarized issues is so elitist its stupid. Ive been trying to “educate” deaf people to quit pigeonholing themselves into being the victim and change their approach to ASL linguistics. Why have a signed language thats so abbreviated that half of the comments deaf people post online display poor grammar because they write the same way they sign. If they werent so hung up on their “internal” idea of how “deafies” should function maybe their “culture” can start addressing how it can be easier to function in society with a few changes in attitude. And because arguments with deaf people always never get resolved…I am outta here…and good luck wasting more time over a stupid free speech item.

Tavian said:

June 29, 2012 at 9:09 am

JJ,
No I am not kidding you. The issues I listed for you are issues of concern to all minority populations including African-Americans, Native- Americans, Asian-Pacific Islanders, the overall disabled community, and so on forth. I agree that we should stop seeing ourselves as victims. That is WHY we are objecting. Because we choose not to be victims and to demand equal, appropriate treatment which includes respect of our culture, our language, and our personhood. Best, Tavian

To me, it seems clear that JJ, despite being born deaf, has come to the conclusion that ASL is not a real language. It's a shame. He compares it to English grammar and structure, and since they aren't the same, he says that ASL is stupid. His last words mention this whole thing as being a "...stupid free speech item." Here's what I need to say about that -

Freedom of speech is a right for everyone. The U.S. Constitution grants it. That is why people can say whatever degrading racist, sexist, etc etc, anything they want and not be penalized under law for it. That much is true. That same principle applies here, I suppose as well. However, anyone has a right to respond and stand up for themselves as well. It's nice to see so many in the Deaf community doing just that. When I was younger I saw a lot of Deaf people just sit back and be passive regardless of how offended or hurt they were. Historically for Deaf people, that's how it's always been. What's worse is that most of the hearing world has little to no idea about these things, and therefore, any one of them who could show their support don't even know it's needed.

It's my goal with this post to let those of you who would otherwise never know of this become aware and informed. Granted I can't give you every detail about this issue in a blog post, and that is why I encourage all of you to look into this for yourselves. If you feel strongly enough that St. Martin's press should not go through with this, and that Kristin Henson should not be able to profit from this venture, then share your thoughts in the court of public opinion. Click on the Change.org's petition widget on the right hand side of this page so we can let those people know what they are doing is morally wrong, and while you're at it, show those in the Deaf community that even though you are a hearing person and know little about them, you support their rights. Deaf people need to see this from hearing people now more than ever. It's a good time to start, and if you take that time, I thank you from the bottom of my half-Deaf (CODA) heart.

Until next time,

R. M.

Audism Experiment #3

Hello to all,

Time to share my findings of experiment #2, where the blog was labeled only with words that are generally audistic in nature, or are used in audistic ways. Those labels were;

- cochlear implants
- hearing aids
- hearing impaired
- disabilities
- disabled

Here are the screenshots of the Google Adsense ads on my page when I viewed it;

So we can now see what was there. One ad for interpreter positions, one for cochlear implants, four for hearing aids of some type, one from what appears to be an assistive hearing technology company asking for testimonials, two regarding disabilities (dyslexia, and respite care for children with developmental disabilities), and one random ad from Netflix (interesting that many Deaf people are on them for their lack of closed captioning of content in their internet streaming service - though I'm quite positive it's really a coincidence).

From those of you, or, rather, the one of you (you know who you are and a big Thank You) who responded with what they saw, here is that person's breakdown;

- Three for hearing aids, one of those for hearing aid repair
- One for interpreter positions
- One for "Top Grants for 2012"
- Two for hearing problems related to Tinnitus
- Three related to disabilities

I guess for the most part this comes as no surprise. All the labels were geared towards these results. It was more or less a control group. For Experiment #3, i will add no labels at all to this post, and we can see what Adsense will do. There will be one more post to follow that one where all the labels will be solely for Deaf friendly labels. Following that post will be all the results and what conclusions we can draw from them. It's a somewhat fun thing to do on my end, and I hope my prediction is correct in showing those of you who know little to nothing about Deaf Culture/Community can get a first hand look at one of the forms Audism takes.

Until next time,

R. M.

A Look at a CODA's Deaf Family - Update

Hello to all,

A while back I wrote a post entitled "A Look at a CODA's Deaf Family". In it, I had talked about a Deaf man that I know who was coming to the end of his time with us on Earth. Sadly, I have to say that his time came about two weeks ago. Earlier today was his memorial service, held at the school for the deaf (or one "i" hand tapped twice on top of the other, if you will) where he attended and later worked.

In my previous post I had mentioned what he meant to me as a member of my Deaf family. I won't get into that again, but I do want to talk about the service today. I had the privilege of meeting his Deaf family.

I have to mention first about my own father's passing four years ago. My sister and I had decided to split up the responsibilities of that came along with the process of funeral/ceremonial decisions, notifying everyone, writing the obituary, and seeing our mother was ok, etc etc. I had asked to handle speaking with the funeral director to make the service a little more "Deaf" friendly. One of the things to be done was to have no aisles of chairs in the middle of the viewing room. I did not want my father's Deaf friends to have to look at the back of each others' heads. In an attempt to allow everyone to see what everyone else was signing, we arranged the chairs in a large "U" around the room. It was good for about 40 or 50 people. When people began to arrive, we quickly ended up with far more people than anticipated. Friends came from all over and we had to put chairs in the middle of the room in rows/aisles, anyways. At least we tried, right? What we ended up with was upwards of close to 100 people. Some had to view the service from the other room because we ran out of space!

I say this because at the time, it really impressed upon me what "Deaf family" means. I remembered so many faces of the people I used to see at Deaf Club meetings and get-togethers from my childhood and they were all so wonderful. I also saw many faces of people I had never met before, but whom were great friends with my father at one point in time or another. It really helped me see how much Deaf people cherish each other and how close they all were. That is what a Deaf family is.

With that said let me move onto today. This service was at least twice the size of my father's and held in the school gymnasium. Friends and family gave some touching and personal speeches. There was also a closing prayer conducted by a Deaf Father. That is something I had never seen before. It was such a cool thing to witness. The reception was held in the cafeteria, a slideshow in the meeting room, and the school's museum, something this man had the largest hand in creating, was open for all to view. There was also a video camera setup for people to give their goodbye wishes, share stories, and anything else anyone felt had merit to mention. I saw former teachers and students come today, too. He had reached a lot of people in his time.

And just like any typical get-together in the Deaf Community (with hearing people involved), the Deaf will stay until they are told to leave. The crowd was over half out by the time myself and ELF had left, and nearly all of them were either Deaf, CODAs, or other members of the man's family. And here they all were, his Deaf family. It amazed me to see it yet again, and I cannot explain in any decent amount of words how much it touched me to know that even though most of the Deaf people there were not a part of my Deaf family, the man's wife went out of her way to make me feel like I was part of their's, no matter how small a part it really is.

I guess this is the only way I can explain it. Compared to probably just about everyone else there, I was little more than an acquaintance to this man and his wife. Most of their blood family I had never met or seen until today. I think it's that connection a CODA has or can have with other Deaf people, without even having spent a great deal of time with them, that makes it a Deaf family for each other.

With so little, in relative terms, his life had a significant impact on me. For everyone else there who was much more a part of his Deaf family, I can only imagine how his life impacted them. I have to believe that its value is exponential. Everyone who attended, and everyone who could not but did so in spirit, is a better person because of his impact in our lives. That's the power of Deaf family, and I am honored to have felt its impact again. I love you, man.

Until next time,

R. M.