If I was reading, writing, with people, in a movie, in class, at the store, in my car, asleep, waking up, trying to do anything at all. It didn’t matter—I needed to go, all the time. It was consuming my life.

I mean to be, that I am twenty-five years old and have an appointment with a urologist. Is she doubting this? Is this normal? Behind me, the people in the waiting area appear to be in their sixties or older. One is with a younger companion, who I assume is there to help him. The rest, like me, are alone. Though my back is to them, I sense their gaze.

I take a clipboard with forms to complete and turn to the room. No one is looking at me. Some watch the Kardashians on the wall-mounted television. Others stare at nothing. Underneath the TV is a coffee station and a water filter. I think I should start drinking water so that I am ready to provide a sample, but I worry that I will be waiting a long time for Dr. Ryan and will need to go before he calls me back. I pour a cup of water and drink it slowly, trying to focus on the TV screen—as Kim works with designers in her store—trying to ignore that everyone must be wondering why I am here.

To become deaf is isolating. Being unable to hear takes away a main means of connection. Even if I see you talking, I can’t tell fully what you are saying—can’t sure what you are thinking, or what you want, fear, hope. Not unless you write it down and wait for me to respond—which is exactly what I once did with the deaf father of a friend.

I was at a house party with a lot of cheerful talkers, and I felt sorry that this fellow was limited to his daughter’s sign-language, so I wrote on a napkin, “Where is home for you?”

“SW Kansas. Near Dodge.”

“Do you work there?”

“Farm.”

Whew, I thought. At least farming was something that could be done in a solo fashion, although I wondered who helped him negotiate grain prices or buy implements. I wrote one or two more questions about cattle and soybeans, but then, because conversing in this fashion felt cumbersome, I gave up. Even though I was half-deaf myself,  I went back to the larger discussion, chipping in my reactions to a recent film—“It worked for me. Everything but the soundtrack, which seemed like it was constantly telling me how to feel.”

I’m fortunate. Unlike that deaf farmer, I still get half of what is being said by people around me, even more when I am in quiet settings. During one-on-one conversations, I probably don’t seem too distracted or obtuse. However, I still have to do what others who are hard of hearing do. “Sorry, could you repeat that?” I ask. Or if I am really struggling, “Do you mind spelling that word?”

I’m self-conscious at such moments. I remember what it is like to be a person who hears well. I know how frustrating it can be to try to talk with someone who has bad ears. As a child, I actually had good ones, but my father didn’t. He was the half-deaf one, the one who had trouble hearing me in the car or in restaurants, asking me to repeat and repeat and repeat.

I wonder what you thought the day I was born.

You said you feared you might lose me before I even was, before the air of this world burst into my lungs and my cries swelled and retreated. I, your daughter—the child you named—weighed, measured, and checked for good health.

There I was in your arms, the lights bright and the blankets soft. My head rested in your hand as you gazed down at me. Maybe you thought: She’s going to take care of me one day; that’s what kids are for.

A tiny scarab charm, the size of a large teardrop. A solid-gold Egyptian beetle. A microscopic, undecipherable hieroglyph engraved on the back. I found it a few days after our trip ended, wedged under the backseat of my beat-up red Chevy Vega—the car jammed with suitcases, blankets, clothes, books, toys, snacks, two car seats, and a purse. My two small children and I had barely fit.

They danced traditional rhythms that celebrate harvest and rites of passage. I yearned to share the experience.

And so began my son’s love of dance.

“African dance is my passion,” he told me, at age seven.

As his love for African dance grew, I was intrigued to discover what inspired him. I would sit in a corner of the dance studio, editing documents, watching the beauty and power of this dance. They danced traditional rhythms that celebrate harvest and rites of passage. I yearned to share the experience.

“You must learn to dance like your son,” the instructor told me, after one of my son’s classes. His smile was kind and engaging. “You will feel good in your body. You will feel free.

To peel a mangosteen, you must be gentle. Though the smooth purple exterior is hard to the touch, it takes only a squeeze to reveal the soft, perfumed bulbs inside. Hold the fruit between both palms and press—if ripe, the skin should give slightly, like an avocado. Apply pressure on both sides until  the shell cracks. Careful not to press too hard, or you’ll bruise the fruit inside and stain your fingers magenta.

For a while after I came out to my parents, I felt like I was squeezing a mangosteen. No one had energy to fight, so we simmered in silence. Somehow, that was louder than the screaming. My girlfriend and I stopped calling every night. When I went out to meet her, I just said I was “going out for a while.” At most, my mom would reply with a curt, “hum.” My dad said nothing at all

My mother is right. I am paranoid. I worry, and I fret, and I break down the intonations of my father’s voice like I would break down a musical score, but I cannot allow the mania to escalate to the point where we must have him institutionalized again. To the point where he hurls fury at me until I’m left dry-heaving on the side walk in front of the hospital, uncertain of how to breathe.

My father has always been thick-skinned.He can slice into his fingers and brush up against scalding pots without wincing. He had two major bike accidents when I was growing up. The first time, he got a stone lodged in his forehead, damaging a nerve so that he could only lift his arm to a thirty-degree angle for months. The second time, he blacked out and the asphalt razed the skin off his face like a cheese grater.