This one goes to eleven

If volume was any indicator of health, I could have told you by Wednesday afternoon that Harper was feeling right as rain. A physician confirmed this morning that Harper is, in fact, fine, and everything's healing nicely. (And when I made my comment about volume to him, he replied "I don't think that's a good measure. She didn't seem to have any problems creating some volume the other day.") More importantly, he gave me clearance to send her back to daycare, and I practically peeled out of the pediatrician's office to get her there, pronto, since my ears are bleeding from 6 straight days in her company.

Her level of loudness is really only something that can be appreciated if you're around her. And it's not like Aaron is a shrinking violet, so the two of them combined are absolutely deafening. I have yet to meet a daycare teacher, babysitter, family member, person in line at the grocery store, etc. who doesn't comment on two things (and it's the same two things with both of them):

1.Wow, you've got a talker, huh? (And when I say sadly "no, I have two talkers", I always get looks of sympathy. Which I appreciate.)

2. Whew! Nobody's going to ignore that one!

Which means not only is it THAT LOUD, it's THAT LOUD- ALL THE TIME.

We have a friend who comes to visit regularly who wears a hearing aid. It's a really nice hearing aid; it adjusts to the ambient noise in a room automatically and resets itself regularly to recognize new volume levels. I am not kidding when I write that he can't wear it when the kids are around- they're so loud that his earpiece starts giving feedback, and doesn't know what to do- adjust to typical room noise and adult voices, or the frequent screaming and yelling that's as loud as a jet engine? After 5 minutes in their company, the hearing aid just tilts and shuts down, essentially saying, "let me know when normalcy has been restored". If I were him, I'd just take it out entirely while the kids are awake. I think they'd be much more palatable that way.

This should give you an idea of how loud they are: we have motion alarms set on the sofa. When they're disturbed by a dog jumping up on the furniture, they give off a high pitched alarm that sounds for a second or two, to scare the dogs away. Occasionally if the dogs (2 sixty pound mutts) start on a barking frenzy (which only happens when something really awful occurs, like another dog dared to walk on the street by our house, or the postman had the nerve to actually leave mail in our mailbox), the alarms might go off once or twice from the sound. Harper sets those alarms off with her voice a minimum of 6 times a day. Even our 7 year old neighbor, the 3rd loudest kid on the block, dropped her jaw when she realized that. I could see the defeat in that 7 year old's eyes when she realized she couldn't ever hope to achieve the earsplitting shrillness my 2 year old has mastered (having spent the past 28 months being tutored in loudness by her older brother).

A couple of months ago a friend of mine took me to a shooting range to teach me how to use a handgun. He let me use his ear protection, which was a fancy set of headphones that had a microphone worked into it somehow, so when he would speak to me, I could hear him perfectly. When anything louder than a speaking voice sounded, the microphone cut off automatically, so that gunshots were muffled. I can't stop thinking about those headphones lately. I crave them. I need a pair to wear around the house. If they sold them at Target, I'd already have them (and in fact, I'd be wearing them right now). It was the first time I had ever shot a handgun, and I think I did pretty well (and I hope he doesn't post here and contradict me). I'm convinced it's because compared to a day in the company of my children, a room full of weapons firing is relatively soothing.