Listen Up - Part 5

This week is all things audio. I’ve already talked about my early ruse to memorize books in order to trick people into thinking I could read. I’ve talked about my discovery of audiobooks and how they completely redefined my childhood. I’ve talked about how I listened to my text books on fast forward during college. And I’ve talked about my eight year audio book fast after I graduated from college during which time I forced myself to learn to read.

But onto the present. I really hate silence. That’s not true, sometimes when it’s really truly quiet I love it. I love getting lost in my own head and inventing new worlds to entertain myself. I love making up stories and filling the silence in my head with my own words. What I hate is white noise. I’m so used to listening to everything around me, that things like buzzing lights and whirring fans often make me wonder if I might be a little bit autistic on top of being a lot dyslexic.

I have a very very hard time focusing on “life” without something in my ears. So I’m plugged into my iPod about 12 hours a day. I listen on the way to work. I listen while I’m at work. I listen on the way home. I listen while at home. There are about 5000 songs on my iPod, and lot of the time I listen to those. But I also listen to audiobooks.

People have a hard time believing me when I tell them that I comprehend audiobooks while also dealing with every other detail of my life. But I do. I remember listening to books-on-tape before bed as a kid and memorizing the last word I heard before I fell asleep. I would rewind the next day and find the exact word where I fell asleep so I’d know where to restart the tape. I’m just a good listener. So yeah. In the past year, I’ve listened to about 150 books. I don’t think I could recite any of them back to you. I gave up on the whole memorizing books thing shortly after getting diaconosed with dyslexia. But I could definitely tell you all the minor details of the plots.

I concider myself very lucky. I was introduced to audiobooks very young. And I was never alloud to believe that being dyslexic would stop me from achieving all my goals. I have had nothing but achedemic success. As an adult, I have succeeded in my carrer, developing a reputation as having a strong attention to detail and the ability to keep large amounts of data organized in my head.

I’ve never thought of myself as stupid. And I know learning disabilities don’t have anything to do with intelligence. But I really don’t think I’m all that “smart” either. I’m just a really good listener. If I’d learned how to read in first grade like a normal person, maybe I’d be better at zoning out and selective listening. But I’ve never been normal, and I probably never will be. In the long run, dyslexia hasn’t been much of a disability at all. Cause I can read now. Even my spelling is improving. And you probably can’t listen nearly as well as I can.

Joke of the Day

What's another word for syninim?