Kids are loud and they are the loudest at the moments I need them to be the quietest. They scream and squeal; they hoot and holler and they never speak with their indoor voices regardless of what I threaten them with. Furthermore, allow them to get just a tad excited and it's like they're riding a roller coaster while still sitting on the living room sofa. They're youthful merriment bounces off the empty walls only to still be heard years later.

Fathers have made everything below screaming level mere white noise. That's why the television is set on maximum volume and why music blares from my headphones to echo in the bedroom without fazing me one bit. We've trained our ears to ignore the chatter around us. Hearing aids are really devices that reset our listening levels that other force upon us and we have to start tuning out all over again. Soon, others are complaining that the little device isn't working as it's supposed to, but we're happier than a screaming kid at a McDonald's PlayPlace.
Truth is, there's quite a bit of stuff we don't want to hear. We choose to ignore the requests for money or to borrow the car knowing we'll be the ones putting gas back in the tank because, well, that's not what they borrowed the money for to begin with. We also try to ignore their rambling unedited stories of their weekend antics because we know we should scold and discipline them for being idiots, but really, we did the same things at their age and our parents ignored us. It's tradition.
It's even worse nowadays because the kids come into a room babbling away and when I take the time to go "Huh?" they're not even talking to me but the latest love interest on the phone plotting what they're going to do this weekend that I'll need to tune out later. It's even worse with Bluetooth because they actually look like they're talking to me. Of course, I like to join in the conversations anyway just to let them know I'm there and sometimes what I shout actually goes with what they're talking about. Other times it merely irritates them and I hear, "It's just my dad. He thinks we're talking about choking the grass."
And there is the real secret of dads being deaf. We've trained ourselves to tune noise out so that everyone has become used to us not being able to hear their ramblings and in that comfort they relax and talk freely. Sometimes too freely and I learn things my kids wished I hadn't. You see, we do hear everything and at the most embarrassing moment for the speaker we'll prove it just to see them squirm and blush. Deafness is our way of eavesdropping without having to strain to hear the whispers, unless of course they're asking to borrow money. Then, I really am deaf.
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