Story of teh Day 8/ 28/ 2009

Harriet came for Shabbat dinner.
She is used to us.
That is good, because it saves us strange looks when we are just being ourselves; and she expects a lot of non-sequiturs.

Harriet also signs some, which means that Sarah is not left out of the entire evening’s conversations.
And signing became a topic during dinner. Practicing signing. Like practicing any foreign language.

With most foreign languages, maybe with all of them, if you are Hearing, you can play tapes or CDs or whatever the newest technology is, of the language and practice speaking it while driving.
This is not something that is readily available to you, with sign language.
You can’t watch a video of someone signing and respond to them, while driving, or you will most certainly be ion your way to the hospital or the morgue in a very short time.
You can , however, practice your fingerspelling by signing all the street signs and billboards. And you can practice your interpreting with the songs on eth radio or the news bits from NPR. Of course, since I don’t’ hear very well, I am probably misinterpreting anything I think I am hearing from them….

And, as Sarah was pleased to inform Harriet, I also sign “CVS,CVS,CVS” while I am driving- hoping I don’t’ forget to stop there to buy toilet paper or whatever.
Sarah also explained how I am always signing compete conversations to myself and it is very odd.
I told her, “I also speak complete conversations to myself. It is called talking to myself. People do that.”

Although, according to Sarah, they don’t’ do it in sign language.

Of course, I do talk a lot, even if it is not always to myself.
And I also talk in my sleep.

It is a family trait.

My husband says that most of the time he can’t make out what I have said. Except, a week ago, I clearly said “Kleenex.”
And , last night, I clearly said, “I don’t’ like the Deaf School.”

Not that it surprised him.

"Of course," I told Harriet," that is nothing, my sister Maggie talks in her sleep- sitting up with her eyes open. "
That is spooky.
And Harriet, who must, in some way, be a cousin, told a story about her younger daughter , Joanna ,walking in her sleep.
Her sister, Liz, got up and followed her to make sure she didn’t’ hurt herself.
That can be dangerous. Especially if the house has stairs.
Dangerous.

The most dangerous sleep experience I have had came from talking in my sleep. And I wasn’t even sitting up with my eyes open.

When I was in high school in Israel, I had two roommates. One was Debbie, the other….her name escapes me- which is probably good.
I had been studying for a Latin exam, and my focus on this must have carried over into my sleep.
I was jabbering away in Latin- probably some fascinating thing like conjugating verbs.
The 3rd (nameless ) roommate awoke to my jabbering away in Latin and decided I was possessed.
She wasn’t’ the brightest bulb in the box.
Anyhow, she decided that the best thing to do was to stab me.

Fortunately, it was late at night, and she couldn’t’ find a knife- or she didn’t’ have one, or whatever, so she woke Debbie up to help her find one.
Debbie, who had a lot higher wattage than the other gal, got another person to restrain the stabber.
Anyhow, I got to sleep until morning- when this close call was related to me by several people. (They all got to wake up for it…they must have thought it was amusing to let me sleep through it , or something.)

I am sure there is a moral to this story.

I haven’t found it ,yet, though, and that was 33 years ago.