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Deaf chat nights bring together people of different backgrounds, ways of conversing | The Argus Leader | argusleader.com
Every Friday night, Linda Cheek watches the same scenario unfold when people walk into the Pizza Plus restaurant on West Sunshine.
"They see all the hands moving and they stand there for a second," Cheek says.
Then, says the president of the Deaf Awareness Group of Southwest Missouri, the people go to the counter to order and ask about the hands moving in animated conversation behind them.
They hear that it's deaf chat night.
"Many times the hearing people are surprised," Cheek says, "but they're welcome to come."
As it turns out, newcomers quickly learn that the small deaf community at the group's weekly chat is a welcoming one: Smiles and waves -- gestures few could misunderstand -- greet the hearing who wouldn't know the American Sign Language motions for "Nice to meet you."
Yet within the group itself, there's also acceptance of differences -- not only of demographic differences of age, gender and socioeconomic status but of different ways of communicating.
"We just include everyone here," Becky Avila says. "We don't say, 'You're not deaf enough, you're not hearing enough.'"
With long manicured fingernails polished deep purple to match her Harley-Davidson motorcycle, the 52-year-old Avila is considered a "total communicator." She signs, speaks, reads lips, and -- thanks to a cochlear implant -- hears.
While Cheek explains that deafness is hereditary for a scant 10 percent, "it goes way back in my family," Avila says. "Way back."
Nevertheless, she's the first person in her family to learn American Sign Language.
But she won't be the last.
As her 13-year-old son, Cody, slowly loses his hearing, just as his mother did in her teens, he'll face the decision of whether to undergo a cochlear implant, just as she did four years ago.
Avila's tough enough to have driven her Harley on Route 66 to Los Angeles -- and she says she's not afraid to ride by herself, either. Yet her eyes well with tears at the memory of waiting to switch on the new implant until she saw Cody, then 9.
"I got to hear my son talk for the first time," she says.
She and Cody attend the chats together most Friday nights.
Both socialize, but Cody, who now wears hearing aids, also learns his second language: signing.
The chats are time for the young to learn from adults -- and for the hearing to learn from the deaf.
"This is the good thing about adults like Becky being here," Cheek says, "because our kids that are deaf are seeing deaf adults and they're knowing that she's normal, she rides a Harley, so they're learning from her that 'We can do that, too.'
"And then we have moms like Belinda, who's hearing and her son is deaf, who is still learning about deaf culture and sign language, and she's learning from Becky. So we have all this learning going on."
Cheek refers to Belinda Evans, who brings her 12-year-old son, Ben, to the chats.
The Jarrett Middle School seventh-grader's hearing is fading as a result of nerve damage suffered when he was young. "And by the time he's 20, he will be deaf," his mother says.
For now, though, Ben, his brown eyes watching speakers' faces intently, speaks plainly himself and signs at the same time.
"Well, usually I sometimes eat pizza, but I come here so I can chat with my best friend," Ben says, signing "best friend" -- a phrase that includes two tightly crossed fingers.
That best friend would be 14-year-old Michael Cheek, one of four deaf siblings adopted by Linda, who learned to sign years ago as a Central Bible College student. Together, he and Ben spend most of the evening talking and playing a video game in the restaurant's dining room.
In his neighborhood, where he's the only deaf kid, Ben says he sometimes feels lonely.
Whatever their age -- and people of many ages fill the room for the chat -- the deaf need the community they find at such events.
"We need to be able to bond with people like ourselves," Avila says. "It's comfortable. We don't feel so comfortable in the hearing world."
The June 17 chat was the first in Springfield for Ricky Alewine.
Here for a summer internship, the 25-year-old communications studies major from Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., came to the restaurant to make new friends.
A Georgia native, Alewine became deaf after an early childhood battle with spinal meningitis. Yet he's fluent in sign language, his fingers flying as he explains through Cheek and interpreter Vicki Wolfe that deaf chats are not uncommon, despite the fact that the hearing may be unaware of them.
Alewine, who has attended chats at college, in his home state and in South Dakota and Texas, finds them wherever he goes.
"I love to travel and meet new deaf people and make new deaf friends," Alewine says, adding that "it's a little different wherever you go."
In itself, sign language is not one but many languages, Alewine says, noting that there are about 100 different sign languages throughout the world.
"I knew a girl from New Zealand, and she had a different sign language when she came here," he says. "You needed two hands to do the ABC's, while here we just do it all on one (hand)."
Then there's slang -- with an American Sign Language gesture much like "the bird" standing for Washington's Monument in D.C., Alewire says -- and the fact that deaf people gossip, too.
Yet with their hands and fingers circling, crossing each other, coming together and moving up and down in plain sight, how do deaf friends keep fellow signers from eavesdropping?
If they communicate privately, Alewire explains through Wolfe, they'll block their hands with their bodies or even develop a code.
"So friends have silly animal names and stuff," Wolfe says.
While sign language isn't universal -- no matter what the 57-year-old Wolfe was told in college years ago -- the Deaf Awareness Group community is patient with signers who are learning.
Although Wolfe works as an interpreter and is a retired deaf educator for Springfield Public Schools, she says, "I still do not feel proficient in ASL," so attending the chats allows her to hone her skills.
At the chats, Cheek says, the deaf "get to hang out and other people get to learn, so there's a lot of good things happening here."
As for the hearing, there's no need to watch conversations from the checkout counter.
"If hearing people want to come and learn sign language, they're welcome to come," Cheek says. "We won't bite."
Every Friday night, Linda Cheek watches the same scenario unfold when people walk into the Pizza Plus restaurant on West Sunshine.
"They see all the hands moving and they stand there for a second," Cheek says.
Then, says the president of the Deaf Awareness Group of Southwest Missouri, the people go to the counter to order and ask about the hands moving in animated conversation behind them.
They hear that it's deaf chat night.
"Many times the hearing people are surprised," Cheek says, "but they're welcome to come."
As it turns out, newcomers quickly learn that the small deaf community at the group's weekly chat is a welcoming one: Smiles and waves -- gestures few could misunderstand -- greet the hearing who wouldn't know the American Sign Language motions for "Nice to meet you."
Yet within the group itself, there's also acceptance of differences -- not only of demographic differences of age, gender and socioeconomic status but of different ways of communicating.
"We just include everyone here," Becky Avila says. "We don't say, 'You're not deaf enough, you're not hearing enough.'"
With long manicured fingernails polished deep purple to match her Harley-Davidson motorcycle, the 52-year-old Avila is considered a "total communicator." She signs, speaks, reads lips, and -- thanks to a cochlear implant -- hears.
While Cheek explains that deafness is hereditary for a scant 10 percent, "it goes way back in my family," Avila says. "Way back."
Nevertheless, she's the first person in her family to learn American Sign Language.
But she won't be the last.
As her 13-year-old son, Cody, slowly loses his hearing, just as his mother did in her teens, he'll face the decision of whether to undergo a cochlear implant, just as she did four years ago.
Avila's tough enough to have driven her Harley on Route 66 to Los Angeles -- and she says she's not afraid to ride by herself, either. Yet her eyes well with tears at the memory of waiting to switch on the new implant until she saw Cody, then 9.
"I got to hear my son talk for the first time," she says.
She and Cody attend the chats together most Friday nights.
Both socialize, but Cody, who now wears hearing aids, also learns his second language: signing.
The chats are time for the young to learn from adults -- and for the hearing to learn from the deaf.
"This is the good thing about adults like Becky being here," Cheek says, "because our kids that are deaf are seeing deaf adults and they're knowing that she's normal, she rides a Harley, so they're learning from her that 'We can do that, too.'
"And then we have moms like Belinda, who's hearing and her son is deaf, who is still learning about deaf culture and sign language, and she's learning from Becky. So we have all this learning going on."
Cheek refers to Belinda Evans, who brings her 12-year-old son, Ben, to the chats.
The Jarrett Middle School seventh-grader's hearing is fading as a result of nerve damage suffered when he was young. "And by the time he's 20, he will be deaf," his mother says.
For now, though, Ben, his brown eyes watching speakers' faces intently, speaks plainly himself and signs at the same time.
"Well, usually I sometimes eat pizza, but I come here so I can chat with my best friend," Ben says, signing "best friend" -- a phrase that includes two tightly crossed fingers.
That best friend would be 14-year-old Michael Cheek, one of four deaf siblings adopted by Linda, who learned to sign years ago as a Central Bible College student. Together, he and Ben spend most of the evening talking and playing a video game in the restaurant's dining room.
In his neighborhood, where he's the only deaf kid, Ben says he sometimes feels lonely.
Whatever their age -- and people of many ages fill the room for the chat -- the deaf need the community they find at such events.
"We need to be able to bond with people like ourselves," Avila says. "It's comfortable. We don't feel so comfortable in the hearing world."
The June 17 chat was the first in Springfield for Ricky Alewine.
Here for a summer internship, the 25-year-old communications studies major from Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C., came to the restaurant to make new friends.
A Georgia native, Alewine became deaf after an early childhood battle with spinal meningitis. Yet he's fluent in sign language, his fingers flying as he explains through Cheek and interpreter Vicki Wolfe that deaf chats are not uncommon, despite the fact that the hearing may be unaware of them.
Alewine, who has attended chats at college, in his home state and in South Dakota and Texas, finds them wherever he goes.
"I love to travel and meet new deaf people and make new deaf friends," Alewine says, adding that "it's a little different wherever you go."
In itself, sign language is not one but many languages, Alewine says, noting that there are about 100 different sign languages throughout the world.
"I knew a girl from New Zealand, and she had a different sign language when she came here," he says. "You needed two hands to do the ABC's, while here we just do it all on one (hand)."
Then there's slang -- with an American Sign Language gesture much like "the bird" standing for Washington's Monument in D.C., Alewire says -- and the fact that deaf people gossip, too.
Yet with their hands and fingers circling, crossing each other, coming together and moving up and down in plain sight, how do deaf friends keep fellow signers from eavesdropping?
If they communicate privately, Alewire explains through Wolfe, they'll block their hands with their bodies or even develop a code.
"So friends have silly animal names and stuff," Wolfe says.
While sign language isn't universal -- no matter what the 57-year-old Wolfe was told in college years ago -- the Deaf Awareness Group community is patient with signers who are learning.
Although Wolfe works as an interpreter and is a retired deaf educator for Springfield Public Schools, she says, "I still do not feel proficient in ASL," so attending the chats allows her to hone her skills.
At the chats, Cheek says, the deaf "get to hang out and other people get to learn, so there's a lot of good things happening here."
As for the hearing, there's no need to watch conversations from the checkout counter.
"If hearing people want to come and learn sign language, they're welcome to come," Cheek says. "We won't bite."