Pod People

Just so you know, I can't sew to save myself.

My stitches are crooked. I sew snags into all my fabrics. And ten thimbles couldn't stop me accidentally pricking a finger with the sewing needle.

It must have been deeply disappointing for my mum, who had a talent for dressmaking and design, but I just get no enjoyment from sewing whatsoever.

Which is why I find it so very entertaining that, as of today, my new best friend is a 'quick-unpick'.

My bionic friends who use iPods or MP3 players ... do you know what I'm talking about?

That's right.

It's not for a sewing emergency. Not to undo the latest sewing damage I've inflicted on my clothes.

It's to help me plug my audio cable into the sound processors.

 I’ve been analysing the ears of strangers for a while now, while out and about in public, desperate to find other people with cochlear implants. (For those who’ve been tracking my blogs, I’m still on a dismal score of ‘1’ in this little game.) It seems that every time I spot an ear accessory, it’s an earphone of some sort. (Or a Mexican flag, as I wrote about here: http://back-in-the-loop.blogspot.com/2010/03/good-omens-and-april-fools-day.html)

Years ago, I used to be one of these people too. I call them Pod People. You know the ones. Can’t go anywhere without their music playlists. Earphones a permanent feature of their faces. Yeah. When I lost my hearing, I used to look at these people longingly – I really missed listening to music along the commute to work.

When my CIs were switched on, and I was filled with amazement over the slightest of sounds, I looked at these people differently again. Honestly. Couldn’t they just take the earphones out for one second and appreciate the beautiful environmental sounds instead? Why on earth would they want to mask the lovely sounds of … well, trucks speeding by? Or the pleasant sound of emergency sirens blaring? Or the sounds of angry drivers hurling abuse out their windows?

Well, I’ll admit it.

Today I tried it.

And if the smile on my face is anything to go by, I’m going to do it again.

Why, oh why, did I not try this sooner?

Alright, alright, I was busy enjoying the traffic.

And yes, I had intense dislike for the quick unpick and Everything It Stands For. 

But OK, it was mainly because it seemed a bit of a nuisance to have to take my processors off, pull out the quick unpick to undo the latch, then plug in the audio listening cable. Just to hear a quick verse of a catchy song I’d been humming in my head. Nah. Much more fun to get it out of my system by just singing it out loud and out of tune to Jase instead. (*smirks*)

Well it turns out the quick unpick is seriously worth it. (And not just for Jason’s sanity.) Oh how proud my mum would be if she knew I had become the type of person who carries a quick unpick in her handbag, ha ha.

The last time I listened to iPod music while walking around the city was probably back in 2006, maybe very early in 2007, before I lost my hearing. During the times I wore hearing aids, I didn’t bother with the iPod – earphones were pretty well useless and I really wasn’t a fan of trying to position chunky bluetooth headphones around the hearing aid microphones.

So I can only really compare today’s experience to what it used to be like with natural hearing.

And let me tell you. It was very surreal.

With natural hearing, you can control only the volume of the music you’re listening to. Already, when you’ve shoved those bits of plastic in your ear, you’ve started to muffle the background sound (however slight it might seem). Lower the volume of the song and you’ll hear the environmental sounds, but the song will lose a bit of clarity. Raise the volume of the song and you’ll lose the environmental sounds. The only way to really get those environmental sounds back is to remove the earphones.  

With bionic hearing, you can still control the volume of the music you’re listening to. But you can also control the volume of the environmental sounds. And, you can control the ratio of one to the other.

Today, I had this ratio set to slightly favour the environmental traffic sounds (for safety reasons) and I was blown away by how clearly I could still hear the music coming through the listening cable, along with the road crossing signals, general traffic, and nearby chatter. Shortly after, I even had a conversation with Jase, with the music still going in the background. I am pretty certain that I would have had to remove my earphones to have this conversation with him, if I had natural hearing, but the CIs just process both sound streams beautifully. 

Now I’m not saying I would trade natural hearing for bionic hearing. Let’s be serious. That quick unpick might be my new best friend, but it’s still A Bit Of A Pain. (And I’m not going to go into the way music itself sounds to most of us.)

But I will say that I consider these particular listening settings a perk of being bionic. (And I can say that because I’m bilateral and able to enjoy music.)

Plus I’m a control freak. ;-)

Oh and let’s not forget I am also Ultra Cool now. Wandering the city streets with the earphone cable sticking out from under my hair, weaved in behind my scarf. Through the button hole. Tucked into the coat pocket. Yep. Ultra Cool. Right up until the moment I realise I can’t even put my bag down because I am completely Tangled in Cable. (A snort from Jase followed by: ‘you’re gonna need more practice’.)

My name is Daniela. And I’m a Pod Person.

Again.