Our BIG Baby

Modeling the effects of sensorineural hearing loss on temporal coding in the auditory nerve

Dave came into town tonight. We fed him at Houlihan’s and on returning home Anne began a conversation with the neighbors. Gracie, the little neighbor girl piped up with the question, “Do you have a baby?” Anne got that grin across her face that I have come to fear, and answered. “Yes Gracie, I do have a baby inside. He is my baby. Do you want to see him?” She didn’t have to ask twice. Gracie was initially nonplussed with Dave, but Anne explained that Dave has a big brother, just like Gracie does, and that made him the baby of the family. She bought this with the exclamation, “He’s a big baby.” Yes Gracie, he sure is. He dwarfs his lilliputian parents. Dave is no baby, but a grown man. He is in town to attend a wedding. On Sunday, he flies to Hong Kong. He will present the poster that he holds in the picture above.

On a less celebratory note, tonight is the vigil of the first anniversary of my mother’s death. This has been a hard year for my father, her life partner, and my brother, who has lived with them for many years. A few weeks ago, my dad and Chris resumed the international travel that my mother and they all enjoyed for many years, before she became too sick to travel. They took a riverboat cruise down the Rhine. As pleasurable as this trip should have been, it was overshadowed by their still all too raw grief.

I just wish that my mom could have seen our two sons now. I think that they would have lifted her spirit. I know it will, my father’s. They are Anne’s and my future, and in part dad’s too. It should be interesting , when we conclave in Monterey later this year.

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