A scary realization I came to recently is that my hearing isn”t what it used to be, even since I moved here.
My hearing was always something I paid close attention to, especially because of my parents. Both of them have hearing loss, but for completely different reasons.
When my mom was born there were some complications, which resulted in her suffering permanent-partial hearing loss. She wears hearing aids to compensate, though for the first few years of her life my grandparents could not afford to get them for her. Hearing aids didn”t come cheap in the 1950s.
My mother”s hearing loss was never something that held her back. She is a very social person, almost in spite of it.
My dad was a musician who played in various bands in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Hearing protection in rock music was a joke back then. Just ask Pete Townshend, but you just might have to ask him twice.
Dad also worked in a few warehouses while I was growing up. Those places can get quite loud. I should know; he got me my first “adult” job at the last warehouse he worked when I was 19.
Conversations in our house were loud and a lot of content was often repeated. I knew how precious a gift my hearing was. But I guess I played with it as I grew.
Much as I plan to do with my future children, my dad encouraged me to learn a musical instrument. He bought me a guitar when I was 9, which I never really took to, and a set of drums when I was 12. My love for the drums is still such a huge part of who I am today.
I originally set my drums up in the back room of our house. But a short time later, I decided to move them into my room so that I could play with my door shut and not disturb the entire house.
Of course, I didn”t realize that this would make the screeching high frequencies of my cymbals and the overpowering volume of the drums affect my hearing even more so than when my kit was set up in the back room.
Out there the sound waves had more room to travel. The walls of my bedroom essentially acted as an amplifier, blasting those damaging high-frequency waves back at my then-unprotected ears.
When I was about 14, a friend”s mom passed me some earplugs to protect my hearing when I played. From then on, I became an advocate for hearing protection when playing music.
When I got into bands in my younger adult years I always wore earplugs and carried them with me constantly. Many of my bandmates would also wear earplugs, though not at all times.
And when I began working in that same loud warehouse as my dad I also protected my hearing from the damaging whirring of the conveyer system.
During the years since then my hearing really began suffering damage.
One thing I”ve always done is listen to my music at a fairly loud volume in my car. Commuting to work and college meant prolonged exposure to damaging frequencies, and I know I”ve compensated blasting my music for not being in a band for a long time.
One of my favorite things is to blast music while driving along twisty two-lane roads, something I get to do often here in Lake County.
I think this is where I really began to screw up my hearing. For no reason other than it made me feel like I was experiencing the music more like at a concert, I turned my volume knob in my car higher than ever before in the last year and a half. While it was often fun, I”m certainly regretting it now.
I have to say I”m kind of mad at myself, especially considering that I still carry a pair of earplugs with me when I”m not in my work clothes, just in case I am around loud live music.
Hell, I”ve even thought about being the biggest square in the world and wearing earplugs when out at loud bars and clubs, just to protect my hearing.
While my hearing isn”t greatly damaged, unlike the aforementioned Townshend, I still can tell it isn”t as fine as it once was. I have to ask people to repeat what they said more often these days. I sometimes miss or lose details in group conversations or at meetings.
I turned the volume down on my stereo a few weeks back. While it makes me feel like a bit of a square, I know how important my hearing is and I intend to try to protect it at all times as best I can.
The last thing I want is to be fitted for hearing aids before I”m at least a bit gray.
Kevin N. Hume can be reached at kevin.n.hume@gmail.com or call directly 263-5636 ext. 14. Follow on Twitter: @KevinNHume.
