TRUE STORY!

My last 3 months in the army (in 1952) I was with a Field Artillery Battalion and didn’t ever try to protect my ear-drums from the roar of the big guns. About a week after returning to civilian life, I noticed I had an embarrassing hearing loss problem.

O.K. now the story: Today, I was taking my power walk at the beach. As usual, I was fully equipped. I had my water, sunscreen, sun glasses, my BMW cap, a headset playing my favorite music and I had a Nokia cell phone on my belt. I cannot hear the phone ring, so I do check it every hour or so for voice messages. Mostly I carry it just to stay in touch with Anita and in case of an emergency.

Anyway, I was going along at a quick pace, listening to “California Dreamer,” when I heard the phone ring. Bingdida-bing, bingdida-bing, bingdida-bing, went the musical tone. I was ecstatic…Holy Crap, I can hear…miracles do happen; my hearing was back! I grabbed the phone off my belt and noticed the screen was showing only the time of day. I hit the answer key and said, “Hello!, Hello! Hello!” All I heard was Bingdida-bing, bingindida-bing…when I looked up, I saw a bunch of kids lined up at an ice-cream truck and the vendor’s chimes were playing Bingdida-bing tones very similar to those my cell phone uses to signal I am getting an incoming.

A little voice in my inner ear said, “Harvey…you are not only deaf…you are dumb!”