Karl Blessing
New Member
- Joined
- Nov 19, 2017
- Messages
- 3
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Just throwing myself out there after a friend from the west coast mentioned this forums.
While I have friends who would call me 'Deaf', I am not fluent enough in ASL to consider myself anything more than HH (Taken about 4 semesters of ASL, but haven't been practicing over the last two years that I lost a lot of it, especially as I do not have any D/HH peers in my day to day dealings).
I was born with severe to profound hearing loss, the doctors were never entirely sure why, they suspect I had some loss and it worsened when I got the measles at 18 months old. While I did attend a deaf preschool, I grew up in the Army and we moved a lot, as a result I was raised orally with speech therapy and lip reading (most hearies wouldn't notice unless I missed something they said or I pointed it out to them). As an Army brat I moved probably close to 40 times before I finally moved to Grand Rapids in 2004-ish and have been here since, being the longest I've spent in one city.
My goal is to eventually expand my social network, as due to my work (Student employee at Grand Rapids Community College, which I spend most my time assisting the head of the visual arts department, and helping tutor/assist photo students, and in charge of all the inventory checkouts) and schooling, most people I know on a regular basis are in their early 20s, or are the faculty themselves.
Meaning I'm either surrounded by people 10 to 15 years younger than me, or people 15+ years older than me. As a result, I not only feel 'caught in the middle' as a non-signing 'deaf' person among a bunch of hearing people, but also caught in the middle with the age gap making socialization difficult.
I'm currently attending Grand Rapids Community College, which I'll hopefully receive my Associates of Fine Arts with Photography Emphasis by the end of this fall (but will still be taking additional classes in the winter, and probably again for the 2018/2019 to continue working there as a student employee).
Outside of work and studies, I am the treasurer of two clubs (which share a lot of members) the Art Club as well as Women's Issue Now (Feminist club) which I help run the Gender Equity Center, and it is a topic I find important to me as I identify myself as an intersectionalist feminist.
Because I am alone most of the time when leaving the campus, I will just wander downtown Grand Rapids on foot, often shooting urban landscapes of sort, or head further south to the Kent Trails for some night time photography. The last two years my specialty has been focused on both Long Exposure (mostly at night) and infrared photography more of which can be seen on my website.
I have had only one relationship that ended in divorce back in 2012, my three boys (10, 9, 8) live with their mother up in Muskegon with their step dad and their three younger sisters (the girls adore me, I'm "Uncle Karl" to them), I don't get to see the kids as much as I would like, and would love it if they would learn and practice sign language with me over video chat, but it seems that their mother either doesn't have the time or desire to help teach them, or claims that they show no interest in learning despite my oldest wants to talk to me a lot and is sad that I can't hear him on the phone.
(pics are from when the Ex, last minute with only an hour advance notice said she was passing thru town and that could meet up with the kids for me to see them, the woman in the car is my mother, their "oma")
So I guess that's the gist of it, just trying to connect with more people, especially that can relate more to me.
While I have friends who would call me 'Deaf', I am not fluent enough in ASL to consider myself anything more than HH (Taken about 4 semesters of ASL, but haven't been practicing over the last two years that I lost a lot of it, especially as I do not have any D/HH peers in my day to day dealings).
I was born with severe to profound hearing loss, the doctors were never entirely sure why, they suspect I had some loss and it worsened when I got the measles at 18 months old. While I did attend a deaf preschool, I grew up in the Army and we moved a lot, as a result I was raised orally with speech therapy and lip reading (most hearies wouldn't notice unless I missed something they said or I pointed it out to them). As an Army brat I moved probably close to 40 times before I finally moved to Grand Rapids in 2004-ish and have been here since, being the longest I've spent in one city.
My goal is to eventually expand my social network, as due to my work (Student employee at Grand Rapids Community College, which I spend most my time assisting the head of the visual arts department, and helping tutor/assist photo students, and in charge of all the inventory checkouts) and schooling, most people I know on a regular basis are in their early 20s, or are the faculty themselves.
Meaning I'm either surrounded by people 10 to 15 years younger than me, or people 15+ years older than me. As a result, I not only feel 'caught in the middle' as a non-signing 'deaf' person among a bunch of hearing people, but also caught in the middle with the age gap making socialization difficult.
I'm currently attending Grand Rapids Community College, which I'll hopefully receive my Associates of Fine Arts with Photography Emphasis by the end of this fall (but will still be taking additional classes in the winter, and probably again for the 2018/2019 to continue working there as a student employee).
Outside of work and studies, I am the treasurer of two clubs (which share a lot of members) the Art Club as well as Women's Issue Now (Feminist club) which I help run the Gender Equity Center, and it is a topic I find important to me as I identify myself as an intersectionalist feminist.
Because I am alone most of the time when leaving the campus, I will just wander downtown Grand Rapids on foot, often shooting urban landscapes of sort, or head further south to the Kent Trails for some night time photography. The last two years my specialty has been focused on both Long Exposure (mostly at night) and infrared photography more of which can be seen on my website.
I have had only one relationship that ended in divorce back in 2012, my three boys (10, 9, 8) live with their mother up in Muskegon with their step dad and their three younger sisters (the girls adore me, I'm "Uncle Karl" to them), I don't get to see the kids as much as I would like, and would love it if they would learn and practice sign language with me over video chat, but it seems that their mother either doesn't have the time or desire to help teach them, or claims that they show no interest in learning despite my oldest wants to talk to me a lot and is sad that I can't hear him on the phone.
(pics are from when the Ex, last minute with only an hour advance notice said she was passing thru town and that could meet up with the kids for me to see them, the woman in the car is my mother, their "oma")
So I guess that's the gist of it, just trying to connect with more people, especially that can relate more to me.
your pictures are amazing.
... East Coast... for whatever reason I imagined you being over towards the Oregon side...