Before COVID, there had been quite a bit of frustration on my part whenever I’d go shopping or go out for a meal. I’d often pick up some goods, and I’d come to a cashier to pay for these goods. Whenever I’d communicate with the cashier, I’d speak with my own voice. As one would expect, I’d speak with a ‘deaf accent.’
There was one hilarious (or ‘missed opportunity’) episode in the late 1980s. That was before I met my wife Denise. So, one day, I was staying at my parents’ summer house in the Hamptons – I believe I was there for a weekend away from either my research technician position at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary or my early graduate days at UPenn. In any case, my maroon Volkswagen Jetta ’87 was low on gas, and I stopped at the Hess gas station across from the post office in Wainscott. A pretty petite lady gas attendant came to ask if my car needed anything. I said, Fill ‘er up. When she heard my voice, she thought I had a foreign, perhaps French, accent. I said, Oh no, I am deaf. She bent her head slightly down, and looked as if she was a bit disappointed. I thanked her for filling my car and left.
A few weeks later, I had been thinking about that scene, and bumped my head, saying to myself, ‘You dimwit, you could’ve said yes to her question, and she could’ve taken you around the places. Who knows what could’ve happened then?’
Another time took place at Houston Hall on Spruce Street across from the biomedical campus at UPenn. It was similar to the gas station scene in Wainscott, but this time it was with a middle-aged cashier at a fast food (I believe Wendy’s) restaurant. When I ordered a chicken sandwich meal, she didn’t initially understand me. Concerned, she asked me if I had a French accent. In either my deaf or ‘French’ accent, I replied, Non.
On a more serious note, there was one time at Macy’s at the Montgomery Mall in Bethesda in the early 2000’s. I was with Denise and our daughters, and we were ready to purchase some goods. I came to a young cashier, and said something. Recognizing my ‘deaf accent,’ she insisted that I use paper and pen. I refused and insisted on using my voice. Obviously she could understand some, if not all, of what I had said to her, but she was stubborn. So I left her and went to another cashier. From there, everything went smoothly, but I felt as if I was discriminated against by the first cashier, just because (1) she was worried that she might not understand most of what I was going to say, and she didn’t want to make customers (behind me) to wait too long and/or (2) she thought d/Deaf people could only communicate in sign, not vocalize. In any event, I felt discriminated against because she violated my right to speak based on my disability. Hell, she didn’t even try to listen to and get used to my damned voice. She might even understand most, if not all, of what I’d say. Her loss (or at least a loss of any commission on her part).
At the opposite end of the spectrum, a barbeque event took place at a park near my family home in Bethesda when I was a postdoctoral fellow at the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communicative Disorders, also in the early 2000s. When it was meal time for my family, I ordered a BBQ chicken meal. It came with a cardboard food container. When I finished my meal, I thought the chicken was delicious and wanted another one. I didn’t want a meal, just BBQ chicken. So, I came to a guy who was selling BBQ chicken (not the same person who sold me the first BBQ chicken). I asked for the meat. When I received the meat, I thought it’d come with another food container – I threw out the first container after I finished my meal and thought I’d get another container to hold the second chicken. After all, I didn’t want to carry the second chicken in my hands. So, I asked for a container. The guy refused, saying that I needed to order a meal, not just the chicken. So, as one could imagine, an argument arose between him and myself with my children in tow. Of course, they were embarrassed. What added insult to injury was that the guy was the leader in chicken BBQ sales and told all of his peers not to give a container to me unless I ordered a meal. So, naturally, I lost the argument, but in a way, I felt good about the guy, because he didn’t let my deafness or ‘deaf accent’ affect our heated conversation. I felt like we were on equal but opposite terms.