Use Earplugs or Join Beethoven's World. 10/10/21
By: Scott Keiser
One day I decided to go shooting with my friends. I had my mom unlock the safe and grabbed my rifle and a box of ammo. I was in a hurry to get to the range, as my friends were already there. When I had already laid out my rifle and ammo, I realized I did not bring any hearing protection. Since we had only about an hour of sun left, I decided against going home for some ear plugs. We shot around 500 rounds that evening. All of it without any hearing protection. The rest of the night I got a sense of what it would have been like to be Beethoven.
By: Carrie Keiser
The room was loud and her head was spinning but she could hear clearly: “Use earplugs or join Beethoven’s world,” whispering in her head. Why Jenny's mother had ever said that to her, she didn’t understand. Well, it certainly hadn’t made sense at the time her mother made that statement to her. But now in this room full of all noise it was ringing clearer.
In the midst of the current cacophony, she drifts back in time…
It was her freshman year of high school the first time her mom had told her: Use earplugs or join Beethoven’s world. Jenny really didn’t know what that meant, Beethoven was a composer of music and he was deaf. She remembered thinking her mom was crazy, what did that have to do with anything? It wasn’t Beethoven’s fault he was deaf, and how could he compose such beautiful music with that handicap? Which was it her mom was warning her about? Becoming deaf or the need to compose something beautiful in life?
Jenny didn’t dwell on her mother’s words but every once in a while she would be in a situation where they came to mind. That first day of high school, she looked around at her classmates and saw lots of kids with earbuds in, they act like earplugs of a kind, they block outside sound so one can focus on the sound being fed into the ears. But continued use could cause hearing loss and even deafness. Who knew what her mom meant?
Jenny jumped forward a little to the next time the powerful statement invaded her mind. She and some friends were jamming to music while driving to watch the high school football team play against their rivals in the next town over. Everyone was laughing, singing and having a good time, maybe Jenny wasn’t paying as much attention as she should have while operating a vehicle. She was 17. Friends, fun and a road trip were so the height of enjoyment. As her car drifted towards the ditch, because she was rocking out and turned in her seat to include the girls in the back, the words of her mother: Use earplugs or join Beethoven.. slammed into her mind and just at the right moment she pulled the car back into the proper lane. She got to the side of the road, turning down the radio and quelling her shaking hands, got control. Her friends had not understood the dangers, they were enjoying the moment and were confused as to why she had pulled over.
The lesson she took from that moment was to literally turn down or plug up the noise and pay attention or you’ll end up deaf and or dead. Jenny tried harder to not listen to music so loudly and to watch her choices as they could be lasting and permanent.
She snapped back to the present it did make sense, she needed to watch her choices, use earplugs to block out the loud excessive noises around her or she would join the masses of those deaf to the things that really mattered. She needed to compose a beautiful life, one choice at a time placing the music notes just so on the pages of life. Jenny stood up and walked to the door leaving the noise behind. She would join Beethoven’s world. As Jenny took the first steps into her new life direction these thoughts filled her mind: What things do I need earplugs to block out of my life so I can make my life a more beautiful musical piece? What am I deaf to or what should I be deaf to?
|
Earplugs or Join Beethoven's world.
Sometimes makes me hurl.
Rude much Not really
Im quite often chilly
How does this relate to the prompt you say?
Well it doesn't, not really
We look forward dearly.
For our baby is coming April 2022
We will definitely need the ear plugs!
Use Earplugs or Join Beethoven’s World
9 October 2021 Flynn Family Story Slingers
by Cary Holmquist
Once there was a wise man who gave advice to people who came to ask him for advice, but the people never did the things he advised them to do. Now, how was it he could be considered to be a wise man if no one heeded his advice and then told other people about how wise his advice had been?
Well, it kind of went like this. People would come and sit next to this man, who often was sitting on a pleasant park bench. He had come to the park to watch kids play and all the other things that go on in a park—such as flowers blooming, trees growing, birds singing, squirrels running up and down trees, dogs running around playing with the kids and so forth.
Well, people knew that they could come sit down next to him on the bench and tell them their situation and they would ask his advice. He was a good listener and the wise man would ask questions to make sure he understood the situation. Then he would listen some more. And then he would tell them what they could do to make their situation better.
As it turns out, the only people who really took his advice were the ones with whom he got impatient and told them, in almost so many words, to get lost. It seems those people took that advice to mean that they should travel far and start anew. In the end, maybe that is what he meant and so he was wise after all, even though he was annoyed by those particular people, in the end they did what he said and it turned out best for them.
But all the other people really did not do what he advised them to do. They figured it out on their own, it seems, but gave him the credit because he did was listen to their stories and, feelings and told them something simple and they went off and did what they wanted anyway, which was not what he advised them to do. They gave him the credit anyway and so he became known as a wise man.
This went on for a long while and the wise man grew weary of people not really paying attention to him, in that they did not do anything he advised them to do. Sometimes their problems because worse and they would come to him again with these stories of further woes.
So, tired of how this was going, the wise man started wearing earplugs so he would not have to hear their stressful stories and worries. It seemed like he was listening because he nodded pleasantly and sometimes would hold their hand. When they paused at looked at him, he would say something pleasant and they would go off happy enough, thinking someone had listened.
As he did this more and more, the wise man would be daydreaming or remembering some song he had heard and liked and replayed it in his head and so he could be pleasant while people talked and talked. If he had earbuds, he probably would have used them and then it would have been even more pleasant for him.
But, it seemed everyone else was satisfied with how this all went and everyone still thought he was a wise man and told other people about him being a wise man. By this time, he was not even being a good listener. It seemed that his reputation as a wise man—which had mostly depended on him being a good listener—was not even true any longer.
Until he started thinking about jokes and funny stories he had been told or that he had witnessed or knew about. So he would start chuckling and laughing out loud while people were talking to them about his problems.
This odd behavior started to make people resentful—that he seemed to be laughing at their problems. And others got angry at him. So, fewer and fewer people came to see him and sit on his bench and pour out their problems. Life went on for everyone anyway, though no one felt as good about it.
As the wise man realized this, he pondered on how this had developed and thought: well, if I had offered people earplugs, they would not have likely heard me chuckling or laughing—and, since I was not laughing at them anyway, all would have been better.
As it was, the angry, offended people stopped visiting him and he could no longer hear their stories because they were no longer telling them to him. So he was only hearing the memories of them and the old jokes and songs that replayed as he sat in the park.
Who knows how the story might have turned out if he had shared earplugs at the appropriate time? And now, he was hearing only the memories.
Or, maybe he just got too old to hear very well anymore. Take your pick!
October 10, 2021
Myrna Flynn
Earplugs and Join Beethoven's World
Not sure that most earplugs would give then total silence needed to join his world, so I think I will give that approach a "no thanks". I prefer to not put in earplugs.
But, it is totally amazing how Beethoven could continue to compose with his hearing gone. I think that he was so immersed in music, that even though he could no longer hear with his ears, as he wrote notes, he still heard the tones and melodies in his mind.
Now, to hearing aids and your dad-- he hardly ever hears what I say. He claims, and one of your brothers, (I think it was Sean) agrees with him, that I talk too softly. To myself, I sound like I am talking too loudly.
So, I am taking a consensus:
1. As a rule, do I talk loudly or softly in everyday conversations?
2. Do I need to be facing you when I am talking?
3. Can you hear me if I have my head turned away from you?
4. Can you hear me if I am in another room speaking to you?
Your dad's answers:
#1 would be "too softly"
#2 would be "Yes"
#3 & 4 would be "no".
(As you can tell, I had a real problem with thinking of anything to write about this particular subject. This is my pathetic offering.)
Comments
Post a Comment