I always wondered which would be worse, losing one’s eyesight or losing one’s hearing. I can now answer that question because I’m gradually doing both and I can say that losing one’s eyesight is far worse as there can actually be some advantages to losing one’s hearing.

Suffice it to say, I’m NOT aging gracefully and I am not like the African heart-nosed bat that can hear the footsteps of a beetle walking in sand six feet away! While other species of animals can hear a rabbit sleeping, I can’t even hear my wife’s snoring three feet away and believe me, that’s just one of the many advantages of being deaf as a dump truck.

I’m not making fun of deaf people and the difficulties they endure on a daily basis or belittling them as our society once did. I can remember in my childhood that deaf people used to be referred to as “deaf and dumb” because it was thought that deaf people were stupid. At one time they were even denied citizenship as a result of their handicap. On the contrary, I have found that deaf people are quite intelligent as shown by their ability to read lips and use sign language. Try it sometime and you’ll see what I mean.

I can pinpoint exactly when and why I’m losing my hearing and can barely speak above a whisper, and I lay the blame at the feet of auctioneers. For nearly 50 years, I worked ring at auctions of everything from A to Z, from automobiles to a zebra. My problem was that during those five decades of working ring and being the voice for Western Video Market and announcing video auctions every month that sometimes lasted four days, I was hardly ever further than 20 feet away from a speaker and 90 percent of the auctioneers I worked with had the volume turned up too high for the comfort of the crowd.

I know why the auctioneers do it and after auctioning a few charity sales myself, I understand their reasoning. First of all, they want to be able to hear themselves and secondly, they don’t have to expel as much energy with their chant, which always sounds better when the volume is higher.

Interestingly, when we lived in Australia 50 years ago, all the cattle sales I attended from the weekly town auctions to high dollar purebred sales, the auctioneers didn’t use a microphone, and it was so tiring for them they worked in teams which allowed them to take long breaks to rest up.

Not only did all the auctions damage my hearing but it also silenced my voice because for every animal, every car or every doo-dad I turned in the bids by yelling at the top of my lungs so the auctioneer could hear me above the din of the speakers. It finally caught up with me. I know there are things I could use to better my hearing, but I think my voice is shot for good. I don’t want to buy a hearing aid because that makes people think you’re interested in what they have to say. I could also wear a big gold ring in one ear like NBA basketball players and pirates of old did who thought the gold ring improved their hearing and especially their eyesight.

At first my wife liked the fact that I couldn’t talk but she very much doesn’t like the fact I can’t hear, as every time she tries to talk to me my response is always the same: “Huh?”

I’m considering getting a bunch of my road agent buddies together and filing a class action lawsuit against all auctioneers for damages and to buy hearing aids for all us poor ring men as auctioneers have the deepest pockets. Believe me, with what they are making now to sell a bull sale, real estate auction or exotic car sale, the auctioneers can afford it.

If you don’t think us road agents have suffered damages just listen to this conversation I had about the potential for such a lawsuit with two of my ring man buddies:

Me: “Should we file a lawsuit against our windy friends?”

Second Road Agent: “No, it’s not Wednesday, it’s Thursday.”

Third Road Agent: “Yea, I’m thirsty too. Bartender, another round please.”