Moot Thoughts & Musings

Do you know that part in Gone With the Wind where Scarlet cries "I will never go hungry again!!"? Sometimes I feel like that about summer. After surviving four and a half summers in New Orleans with hardly any air conditioning (we had one window unit that would sputter forth a little cool air that you could feel if you sat directly in front of it), I feel like crying "I will never be hot again!". We have 3 window units in our apartment, and I want to hug and kiss them all.

Anyway, that's not really what I wanted to write about. I feel like hiding behind a tree sheepishly after yesterday's post. Today we went down to CHOP (the children's hospital) for Ellis's first speech therapy session ever. And--oh my word!--he was fantastic!!!!

She did the first steps towards auditory awareness where he puts the block in the bucket when he hears her shake the rattle, then experimenting with long and short sounds (feeding the doll a cookie: "mmmmm"; brushing the doll's teeth "brush, brush"), and talking to a ball before putting in the ramp. Some of the things she was doing just to introduce him/me to the activities. He did everything! He totally got it!! He even vocalized! He was hearing stuff. And best of all, he was having so much fun. It was like we were sitting down for an hour of totally awesome new games. It was totally amazing!

It so satisfying to see him using his new CI and enjoying it. And it was fun for me to share sounds i enjoy with him, like the descending fourth of a European ambulance siren, complete with Doppler effect. Heh, heh. Chris and I were totally cracking up making his cars do that last night.

When I was pregnant, I had dreams of starting Ellis on Suzuki violin when he was 3 or so, or whenever he seemed mature enough to handle it. I thought it would be fun to play duets (I play cello). I kind of dropped that idea when he was born deaf. I think he will be able to enjoy music in his way (he already loves dance parties with music thunking and vibrating on our hard wood floors), but it takes a special ear with good intonation to play a stringed instrument well. I'm totally cool with Ellis not playing violin; it was just one of those ideas that I had to readjust. And I guess if he ever wanted to, I wouldn't stop him--a stringed instrument is a nice resonance chamber, after all--but it's just not something I am considering at the moment.

Anyway, I only bring up Suzuki violin, because heading off to speech therapy had me feeling strangely reminiscent of going to music lessons. Only I'm the parent. In the Suzuki method they talk about the parent-student-teacher triangle. The parent extends the lesson to the child's everyday environment, so it's important for the parent to be an integral part of the lesson, especially when the child is young. Suzuki also talks about studying and listening to music for one's individual enjoyment. The child should want to play because they enjoy the music, and it's a part of their everyday lives. (I had a little Suzuki teacher training.) So, in a sense, even though Ellis isn't studying violin, we're still learning new things, how to use and to enjoy our senses. And hopefully, how "to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever."