A WAY OUT OF SILENCE

 

            Her hands were her life; without them there was nothing. Dirt ran up and down the crevices, some longer and deeper than the others did lining her fingers and hands .In some way, the ruts represented all of her, her achievements and bad experiences, like a path through her existence. Is it possible that hands could hold that much distinction in a person? Gently, with warmth and happiness she tentatively placed her cold hand on mine allowing me to see her as a beautiful woman with many stories to tell. She began to reveal her way out of silence. Now she could communicate with the hearing world through me. A-L-L-I-S-O-N she spelled slowly not yet sure of my understanding. I moved my open hand across my face then placing my index and middle finger together against my other hand tapping twice, saying, “What a beautiful name.” Immediately, using my hands I had, made Allison smile. Although she knew she would be heading back to the streets, she now had a smile, a bit of self-pride and a new story to add to the beautiful paths she carries every day, her hands.

            The Jewish youth group board members had arrived at the soup kitchen at NYU. We began to set up and were assigned jobs for the night. When we were finished I couldn’t believe how many people with unclean faces and blank expressions that waited. I felt as though the world outside was another planet. They entered, shivering from the freezing streets they called their homes coming into warmth.  My job was to take their coats giving them respect and showing them that they should be treated the same as any other person. People walked in talking to anyone they could for conversation. The hour of assigned time had passed by and it was now time for the volunteers to switch stations.

            I stepped into the clothing room, where the donated items were pilled high.  It was a beautiful sight. This reflected the time and effort put into organizing the soup kitchen. Not only did it display the hard work of the people who were actually there but also the people that donated all of these clothes. It was an admirable sight, an event I wish I would be able to learn how to organize as I grow up. Volunteers filled the room sorting the clothes. The small woman I would later know as Allison was walking from volunteer to volunteer, struggling to get someone’s attention. She was a familiar face to all the weekly volunteers, trying to communicate, but she was never successful. I walked closer to her beginning to hear the women’s speech, which was indistinguishable.  She had a look of frustration.  Putting together her look of helplessness and her speech it than became clear to me she was deaf. Volunteers were speaking too fast for her to lip read.

Very clearly annunciating each word I said, “Do you need help with something?”

A small smile formed on her face. I signed are you deaf? Wondering if what I had suspected was true.  Her fist began to nod, meaning yes in sign language “Can you help me please.” I helped her get clothing, food. I translated the banker’s advice helped her sign up for a place where she could spend Passover, and helped her navigate her affairs through the hearing world. I gave her a pad of paper and pens to communicate with people outside her world.

Allison’s stories never stopped.  Starting off by telling me the how her deafness had kept her shunned for so long. She told me she how she had been coming to the soup kitchen for months hoping for someone who would understand. “I would always wait upstairs trying to get someone’s attention. But nobody ever understood, I was to hungry today to be ignored, so I felt that if I came downstairs someone could help, and you she spelled very slowly are an A-N-G-E-L.”

Gradually the people began to leave Alison stayed telling me all of those paths in her life I had noticed earlier on her hands. She wanted to teach me and make me aware of everything, and she asked if I would be coming back.

The time came when my group had to head home. I said my goodbyes to Allison, sad that this might be the last time I saw her. Conversations on the bus home consisting of compliments, made me aware of how lucky I was to have this experience. Though the group I went with walked away with a wonderful feeling of helping.  I also had the thrill that was able to use material that was taught in school, in real life.

            Months later while sitting in my sign language class at the Helen Keller Institute, I began thinking back to my life altering experience with Allison. The only explanation I had was that sign language wasn’t only taught to me in a classroom where I was learning the alphabet or taking tests and quizzes but it became real life. I had seen and experienced the signing world and loved it. As time has passed since I met Allison I have met other’s who are deaf who have also left a deep impact on me. I will never be able to stop learning sign language not because I am being forced to take classes but because my passion for the language is endless.  In years to come Alison will always be my reference to why it is I am participating in sign language today, she not only left an impression in my heart but also gave me a greater gift than that she helped start a story someplace very personal, my own hands.