Life Lessons

What My Deaf-Blind Neighbors Taught Me About Looking Like A Jerk

It’s easy to forget we don’t know what we don’t know.

Years ago, I lived down the hall from a deaf-blind couple. It impressed me that they were living on their own in unassisted housing. They did have a caregiver that checked in on them, but otherwise they lived independently. The apartment building did have an elevator, but it was slow and we were just on the second floor. It was faster to take the stairs. The building was secured and the main door was a heavy one that closed behind you. It had a small glass window so you could see someone on the other side of the door before you opened it. The stairs were against the wall with handrails only on the other side. They weren’t wide enough for two people to walk comfortably past each other on.

I encountered the deaf-blind guy most often. He would hug the wall with his hands, one holding his guide stick, and feel for the doors and their knobs to open them. Sometimes he would look like he might lose his balance walking down the stairs. The last thing I wanted to do was endanger him by messing up his expected path by being in it when I didn’t need to be. It felt weird to see him coming and immediately move out of his way like I thought he had cooties. The worst incident was the time I walked into the building to see him almost down the stairs. I ended up forcing the front door to close faster, nearly slamming it in his face, so it would be closed by the time he reached the door. It felt so rude to do! Yet he couldn’t see me at the door. He couldn’t hear me if I told him I had the door open for him. I knew someone outside could’ve seen me slam the door in his face. I would’ve looked like the rude person I felt I was being. It was so against my nature!

It was the exact opposite way I was taught to hold the door open for someone. Yet in this case, the most appropriate way for me to help him with the door was to close it before he got there.

He was also a smoker. It was a no-smoking building, so tenants would have to go outside to get their nicotine fix. I would often see neighbors smoking near the building when out and about. One day, I was walking home and saw him smoking alone. Then a guy went up to him and asked if he could spare a light.

No response, obviously. The guy asks him again. Then the guy started getting mad. He got right into my neighbor’s face and started yelling at him variations of “WTF all I asked for was a light you could at least answer me!” At this point I was close enough to tell the guy how my neighbor couldn’t hear or see him.

He was mortified. Most of us in a similar situation would never consider the possibility that person wasn’t ‘ignoring you’ but ‘unable to see or hear you’. He realized he couldn’t even apologize for being the jerk his expression suggested he felt he had been. Safe bet that guy never again asked twice if a smoker ignored his request for a light.

Too often we jump to conclusions, even ones that make complete sense based on our life experiences. We see a jerk slam the door in someone’s face. We see a jerk smoker ignore someone’s request for a light for their cigarette. Except in reality, the jerks really weren’t jerks. Nor were the people who felt like jerks afterwards. We never have all the facts. Keep this in mind the next time we think someone is being a jerk, even to you.

Have you had an experience where it turned out rudeness wasn’t that at all?

Random shout out to: Morgan Evans, Felix Black, Liam Ireland, Zahra Awan, Dane BH, Clement Brian, Tammy Lee, Maddie Cagle, Light Hearted Vision, Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles