Jimbolions

...since my last post?

So much has happened!

First, I've been working with a reporter for the local paper on a story about cochlear implants.  We've actually been going back and forth since shortly after the surgery back in August.  A week or so ago a photographer came to the house to get pictures for the article (including one of me standing in front of a birthday gift from my family: The Beatles boxed set of mono recordings).

I just received the drafts of the upcoming article this evening, and in reading it I realized just how far I've come in such a short time. My sincere hope is that folks will find the article inspiring, and that someone who might benefit from an implant will learn something about this extraordinary procedure.

What else has been up? Well, back on November 14 I attended a Penn State football game with my brother (the tickets were a gift from my sisters; boy what a great family I have!).

I have attended spring games for years, but I never realized just how LOUD 107,000 of my closest friends can be.  It's incredible to be immersed in a solid wall of sound when the crowd cheers.

At one point during the game, I told my brother Bill how ovewhelming it was to hear all that sound.

"You'll probably get used to it before you know it," he said. "It won't be a big deal anymore."

But that isn't true. I'm still deaf. That silent world I used to live in greets me each night when I take off my processor and get ready for bed. I'm back in that bubble until the next morning.

And when I roll out of bed to put the coffee pot on and turn on my processor, I still get that initial thrill when that rush of sound pours into my brain.

No, dear brother, it will always be a big deal. A huge deal. Every morning when I turn that processor on, I leave a silent world and enter one filled with thousands...millions... of sounds to hear or perhaps learn to hear again.

And I'll never take sound for granted again...