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| Life's challenges ... My husband came home from WWII and we lived in a barracks-like building for a while when housing was so scarce. Then he bought land and built a little tar-paper house in his "spare time". We lived in that tiny house for 8 years, meantime starting a "real" house on the same land. It was a learning experience for all of us. By that time I had two boys and another to be born on the day we moved into the "big house". While in the “little house,” we experienced the tragedy of my father's final days of a heart attack, and Jay's loss of hearing because of spinal meningitis. A very sobering experience for the whole family. How do you explain to a five year old that the motions that we make with our mouths are really words of love, but he can't hear them? I taught him to read thru tears and tantrums on both sides, and finally he was admitted to Clarke School for the Deaf in Northampton, Massachusetts, instituted by Alexander Graham Bell because his daughter was deaf and he wanted to help her. This school teaches only lip-reading, and after being there 8 years, Jay went to public school, and then on to college and Union Seminary in New York City. While he was there, he saw a message on the bulletin board asking for "an assistant minister for a church for the deaf". "Well, I am the only deaf kid here," he said to himself, "so I guess that means ME". Only then did he quickly learn American sign language. At last he had found his niche in the world and he has made a success of his life. |
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Mark & Jay |
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Mark
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