I bloody love Costco....

[osodecanela]

So, in closing & cleaning out the office I've found several things that haven't been used & I'll have no use for, many of them gotten at Costco, so I drove over there early this evening before hitting the gym. One thing I found was a CD-ROM set to learn ASL, never opened. It wasn't until I was at the return counter that it dawned on me just how long ago I'd purchased it.

As she looked for the item in her computer, she looked up at me & said they hadn't carried those CD's since 2004.

In the mid-90's, I had a medical assistant who was trilingual; in addition to English and Spanish, she signed fluently. Her older sister was deaf & her whole family signed. (Incidentally her parents were native Spanish speakers with limited English skills, but had learned ASL quite adeptly.) Just as the Hispanic community came to my office when word got around the doctor was bilingual, the deaf community did as well when it they found there was a fluent ASL translator there. I figured it would be a good thing for me to learn to sign. However, right on the heels of buying the CD set, she got married and moved from the area. When she left, so did my deaf patients. I thought I would someday I'd get to it, but then the arthritis in my hands got bad, so it never came out of the cabinet. Sonia left my employ in '96.

And today 20 years after I bought those CDs, Costco took them back, no questions asked.

Comments

[blktalon.livejournal.com]

I'm think of trying to learn that after I get my license. I think I might have a better chance of learning it with my dsylexia than a spoken language

[osodecanela.livejournal.com]

Physically I find the ASL to be quite beautiful and at times quite funny. (I.e. the symbol for Quaker is the twiddle one's thumbs). Unfortunately for me after my staff person left, the arthritis in my hands got fairly difficult and so signing would have become a real challenge. I have been told by a friends do sign that like any other language use is crucial; as someone who at one time was a relatively proficient Francophone, and at the current time saying that my French is rusty would be a complement, I can attest to just how important practice is.