My Cochlear Journey, 1

Today, April 25, 2025, in a West Virginia operating room under general anesthesia, I began to revese a journey that I departed from at a Lake Road, Conneaut, Ohio, house, 50 years ago.

At that time, I was employed in the most despised, ill -suited job for an INFJ. A job that could be a title for a horror movie: I WAS A BILL COLLECTOR FOR SUN FINANCE.

I was standing in this enclosed block-and-glass sunporch, trying to rattle the debtor to the door, when a couple of his snot-nosed kids lit two packs of firecrackers, tossed them into the porch and ran off into the sunset.

KA BOOM.

The things that affect us most detrimenally in life usually happen in an instant. It did for me, at the age of 21.

I was deaf for the next three days. I didn’t see a doctor. I was 21, newly married with responsibility, somewhat invincible, and worked for Sun Finance, which had poor health insurance, let alone any specialty coverage. I “huhed” my way through the next week.

Slowly, my hearing returned. And it brought two acquaintances with it: tinnitus and HF hearing loss.

Tinnitus is ringing in the ears. It goes on 24/7. It is exacerbated by that morning cup of coffee, stress and exhaustion. In my eventual career in journalism, my tinnitus was amply nourished. It was there when I awoke, strengthened throughout the day, and was a steady roar by the end of the evening as I depated the echoey, concrete-walled newsroom with the pressroom for a neighbor. It kept me awake at night and although I love the song, I have not enjoyed the sound of silence for 50 years.

Nor have I been able to enjoy the Simon and Garfunkle classic in its full depth. As I have aged, my ability to hear sounds in the human “high frequency” range has diminished. Looking back to the 1980s, I recall my constant search for a perfect set of hi-fi speakers that could “reproduce the highs.” The problem was not in the tweeters. It was in the receptors. They were dying from a childish prank.

Higher frequencies and their subtle harmonics give music its clarity, depth, and nuances. Human voices, although in the lower frequencies, contain these high-frequency harmonics that impart personality and clarity to speech. Lose your ability to hear them, and it is like trying to listen to life through a landline phone at 10 feet from the receiver. Not only is the sound muddy, it has to compete with all the other noise in the room–and the ever-present tinnitus.

Trying to make a living as a reporter was hell for someone with these defects. I dreaded telephone interviews, especially in the late afternoons when the janitor was sweeping the carpet, telephones were ringing and reporters screaming at each other. But I never got my hearing tested. Ironically, hearing aids were not a benefit in the newspaper’s “insurance” plan.

I made mistakes, embarrassing misunderstood quotes. Interviewing soft spoken children, mumbling teens and rambling politicians made me physically ill. Meeting in huge rooms–oh, how I feared public meetings! And tape recording them was pointless. There was no time to transcribe on deadline, and the recording was as impossible to understand as the real event.

This affected my personal life, as well. Ironically, I volunteered as a sound tech at church with a large sanctuary and 32-channel board. I could no better mix sound than mix with people at a party. Someone would come up to the booth and complain to me about a.squelling noise in the right speaker, and I would respond, “What noise? I don’t hear it.” My apologies go out to all those I doubted and subjected to horrible mixes over the years. But, I was just trying to do what we heard preached each week: “find a ministry, plug in, burn out, don’t rust out!”

I was rusting out from the inside out.

I missed many conversations with my grandson because he is soft spoken. I reached a point where I could not carry on a conversation with my wife: our relationship suffered. I shut down, and sought someone who “understood me at all levels.” I could no longer enjoy my collection of 16mm films, except for the silents. Looking back, I wonder how many films I sold for less than their true value because I had assessed them as having a weak or muddy soundtrack?

Every aspect of my life was affected by those firecrackers. I drove around the world with my left turning signal on because, in my perception, the clicker was not working. I stopped listening to the car radio due to what I perceived as bad speakers. I stopped making films with dialogue because I could never get the EQ right. And, I eventually left journalism, a field I dearly loved.

If you made this far, you are probably wondering why I didn’t look into hearing aids. An why I have what looks like a Temu special on my left ear.

Watch for my next post for these answers!