When Words Are Not Enough

Today, a gentleman walked into my shop.

As I always do, I greeted him first in French, then in English.

"Bonjour."

"Hello."

He smiled warmly, pointed to both of his ears, and then made a soft sound from his throat.

In that instant, I understood.

He could not hear.

For a moment, neither of us spoke. We didn't need to.

He smiled. I smiled back.

And somehow, communication continued.

What struck me most was not his deafness. It was how quickly two strangers found another way to understand each other.

Perhaps because hearing loss is something I know a little about myself.

Over the years, my own hearing has deteriorated significantly. My right ear is now almost useless. In a noisy environment, conversations can become frustrating puzzles. Sometimes I nod when I am not entirely sure what was said. Sometimes I ask people to repeat themselves. Sometimes I simply miss things.

Hearing loss changes more than hearing.

It changes confidence.

It changes social interactions.

It changes how you move through the world.

Yet it also teaches something unexpected: communication is much larger than words.

A smile communicates.

Patience communicates.

Eye contact communicates.

Kindness communicates.

Most of the time, the customer and I managed perfectly well without spoken language. We pointed, gestured, wrote a few things down, and figured everything out.

The experience reminded me of a decision I made while writing my novel Nonimportantech.

At one point in the story, the protagonist, Xiaoyu, temporarily loses her hearing. I did not write that chapter simply to create drama. I wanted to explore how differently people experience reality when one of their senses suddenly disappears.

When hearing vanishes, the world becomes strangely visual.

People's expressions become more important.

Small gestures become louder.

Silence becomes a language of its own.

Of course, because Nonimportantech is still a story full of humor and absurdity, Xiaoyu's hearing loss also causes her to miss some very important information—including the fact that her boyfriend, Sealage, has returned from military training and immediately managed to clog a toilet in spectacular fashion.

Life rarely separates tragedy from comedy.

Often they arrive together.

Standing behind the counter today, watching this customer communicate with confidence despite his disability, I found myself thinking about how adaptable human beings are.

Technology helps.

Hearing aids help.

Phones help.

Writing helps.

But long before any of those existed, people still found ways to connect.

The ability to communicate is not stored in our ears.

It is stored in our willingness to understand one another.

In a small neighborhood print shop in Montreal, a deaf customer reminded me of that today.

And for a few minutes, two people with imperfect hearing managed to have a perfectly successful conversation.