Tech was moved along too fast literally, a rushed ten minutes it felt like to explain the lighting, do the spacing, run the dance two times all the while I'm interpreting and timing it to make doubly sure it doesn't exceed 3 minutes as points get deducted for that...I did notice the music was slightly different but I'm still DEAF even with my hearing aids and all the while focusing on interpreting in a darkly lit area (as a Deaf person it takes 300% of my focus) and the music wasn't loud enough to feel it so we thought it was the sound system. It's a constant struggle with myself trying to be superhuman and do it all perfectly when I am in fact only human...What we should have done is stop and insist to feel the speakers, have them play the music louder until we could hear or feel it and basically assert more time for ourselves as equal rights and opportunity to ensure fairness among the rest of the contestants. Self Advocate! Sighs...Constant living, learning and reminding...
Additionally I wasn't allowed to go backstage to ensure my boss a timely arrival to the stage for his solo (two Deaf minds is better than one in those situations.) As a result, the person backstage was clearly anxious or nervous around him and sent him out early in a panic deducting points off his competition score. We are always adapting to the hearing world and often times accepting work with no interpreters and getting along fine by ourselves but I realized that in a situation like this where you're competing against other individuals, its crucial to insist for equal access and opportunity so we're on equal footing with our other competitors. It is just exhausting to always have to advocate for our rights that sometimes we just want to go with the flow than constantly come up against brick walls.
It's funny because all my life people have always asked me... How do you do it? How do you dance to the music...how do you stay on beat? Do you feel the vibrations through the floor?
Let me tell you...Deaf Instincts, Inner Rhythms, tactics that we have
developed using our other senses such as watching other people and their
reactions or body movements, touching the speakers to reaffirm the
beat, memorizing our movement and music...
It's still an ism we must face...The fact that people even question it and ask (let alone be intimidated or not accept you because they don't know how or are willing to work with Deaf people) is a form of audism. Often times I feel like I always have to go above and beyond, achieve perfection and never be off beat just to prove that Deaf can and do even better. Then when you do make that one mistake (of which everyone does yet we are just in the spotlight because we have to constantly prove that we are just as good or better) it throws everyone back into that age old perception of Deaf can't. We must keep going...keep going after our goals and dreams and never give up. We CAN and we DO just as good or better and are simply human just like everyone else...except Curry...
It's still an ism we must face...The fact that people even question it and ask (let alone be intimidated or not accept you because they don't know how or are willing to work with Deaf people) is a form of audism. Often times I feel like I always have to go above and beyond, achieve perfection and never be off beat just to prove that Deaf can and do even better. Then when you do make that one mistake (of which everyone does yet we are just in the spotlight because we have to constantly prove that we are just as good or better) it throws everyone back into that age old perception of Deaf can't. We must keep going...keep going after our goals and dreams and never give up. We CAN and we DO just as good or better and are simply human just like everyone else...except Curry...
