Yesterday I came across this passage from the Bible in another blog. http://dolcebellezza.blogspot.com/2007/11/fearfully-and-wonderfully-made.html With all the discussion lately about Deaf/deaf and hard-of-hearing, this took my breath away for a few seconds and made me stop to think."The human body has many parts...If the foot says, "I am not a part of the body because I am not a hand," that does not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear says, "I am not part of the body because I am only an ear and not an eye," would that make it any less a part of the body? Suppose the whole body were an eye-then how would you hear? Or if your whole body were just one big ear, how could you smell anything? But God made our bodies with many parts, and he has put each part just where he wants it...In fact, some of the parts that seem weakest and least important are really the most necessary." 1 Corinthians 12: 12-22 NLT
Each of us is important. We all have a place in this community of deaf people whether we're oral or not, whether we're late-deaf or born deaf, or implanted, or whether we cue. We all have something to share with the other.
The funny thing is I didn't get this off a Deaf blog. I got it off one of my favorite bookish blogs, and it was about how she felt she didn't fit in with her family-- not because she couldn't hear, but because she wears red lipstick. (smile) It was actually more than that, but Deaf people aren't the only ones who feel out of step with their families, or out of step with the rest of the world sometimes.
Even as a child when I could hear, I was the only introvert in a family of extroverts. Sometimes I don't know how much of me is "deaf me" and how much of me is just me.
(The above titled, "High-heeled Shoe" was painted by deaf artist Roy Tanner.)
