The short answer:
I’m not so sure anymore.
The long answer:
When I was a kid, I always enjoyed having my hearing tested in school. Perhaps this is just because I never had any problems with my hearing, as opposed to, say, my vision (I’ve worn glasses since third grade). Then again, I never had any problems with head lice or scoliosis or spelling either, but those tests were far less enjoyable. Somehow putting on those headphones and listening for those boops and beeps felt like a little musical game at which I just happened to be awesome. And even though the nurse never told us how well we did unless we failed, I’m pretty sure I never missed a boop. Honestly, I wouldn’t have been surprised if she had told me my hearing was superhuman.
That’s why I’ve never really given much thought to how good my hearing actually is; I’ve just assumed that I hear perfectly fine. But last week, I could tell that my right ear was getting increasingly plugged up with wax until eventually I could hardly hear out of it at all. I realized then that it was time to get my ears irrigated.
If you’re unfamiliar with the procedure, they basically just spray warm water into your ear until the canal is clear. Apparently my family is very ceruminous, for both my mother and my sister have needed their ears irrigated in the past. It isn’t painful, but eventually you kind of start wondering how water isn’t shooting out your other ear by now. In any case, it didn’t take very long to get both my ears cleaned out, and so I was soon back to normal.
Or so I thought. But I quickly became acutely aware that something was different, that my hearing seemed distinctly more sensitive than it had before. I heard this strange swoosh sound, and it took me several seconds to realize that I had just accidentally brushed my finger against my shirt. It seemed that I was now hearing high frequencies much louder than I’d been used to. Everything, the jingle of my keys, the flush of a toilet, the cracking of a knuckle, sounded oddly nuanced.
On the one hand, it was pretty cool, like having superhuman hearing. On the other hand, it was sort of troubling. If this is what all these things sound like when my ears are unclogged, what sorts of things had I missed when my ears were clogged? And how long had I been hearing things through clogged ears, thinking they were normal? I haven’t taken a hearing test in a long time. Perhaps my hearing had been impaired for years without me knowing, and it would have stayed that way had an intrepid (albeit really, really gross) blob of earwax not decided it was time to show me otherwise.
This brings us to the question at hand. Of course, being a good listener doesn’t mean that one is good at hearing but rather that one is good at understanding, empathizing, and interpreting. I’ve generally considered myself to be a good listener, but honestly, I’ve never given it very much thought. Nobody’s ever told me that I’m a terrible listener, but that doesn’t mean that I’m very good at it. Maybe like all those hearing tests I took in grade school, all I know is that my listening is passable. And while I’d like to think my listening skills are superhuman, that’s probably not the case either.
Honestly, it could be that my listening is okay but not nearly as good as I think it is, just as my hearing may have been okay for years but not nearly as good as it is now that my ears are clear. You could say that I haven’t had a real listening test in quite awhile, so maybe I need to get my listening ears cleaned and I don’t even realize it. Unfortunately, I doubt that would be as easy as a few sprays from the Elephant Ear Washer System.
A former friend of mine used to say that people aren’t really listening, they’re just waiting for their turn to talk. (Actually, I think she got it from Fight Club.) I used to think that that’s just cynicism, but now that I’ve started thinking about how good a listener I really am, I have to admit that it might be true with me sometimes. Still, I’d like to believe that if someone really wants me to listen to them, then I’d be able to do it, but I don’t really know. Maybe, then, it’s time for me to see about getting my listening checked out in some way, any way. Listening is, after all, the cornerstone of any relationship. Or so I hear.
Cheers,
-qm
