In the book A Loss For Words, Lou Ann Walker tells what it was like to grow up with parents who are both deaf. She relates that she became very responsible at a young age. She had to do most communicating for her parents. This is presented right at the start of the book in the prologue on page 2: "I was the child who did all my parents" business transactions, nearly from the time I was a toddler. I spoke for my parents, I heard for my parents. I was painfully shy for myself, squirming away when the attention was focused on me, but when I was acting for my parents I was forthright." Lou Ann made their doctor's appointments and went along to interpret to the doctor and sign to her parents. She ordered for them at restaurants, she corrected grammar in their letters because the deaf have no way to gauge verbal sentence structure and that helps vastly in learning it. She also had to tell them when a call came in saying a friend had died and call others. This relates to some of the deafness issues and situations mentioned in the syllabus. On page 9, in chapter 1, the ignorance of hearing people is shown in the incident at the gas station: "Dad and I had gone in to pay and get directions. The man behind the counter had looked up, seen me signing and grunted, "Huh, I didn't think mutes were allowed to have driver's licenses." Long ago I had gotten used to hearing those kinds of comments. But I could never get used to the way they made me churn inside." Another implication of Lou Ann's parents being deaf was when she walked to their hotel after they left her at her dorm at Harvard. On page 13, chapter 1: "I made my way to their room on the third floor and as I raised my knuckles, it dawned on me that knocking would do no good. I knew they were awake, I could hear the television. I took a notebook paper out of my purse and bent down to shove it underneath the door, working it in and out.
