TAMMY KEITH: What's that you're saying?

I used to feel sorry when I waseating out and noticed an older couple sitting together, nottalking.

Now I get it. They can't hear each other.

It's happening at my house. My husband and I are finding it harder and harder to hear and understand each other.

I've started saying, "WHAT?" to every other thing he says. It's very annoying to both of us. If his head is turned, if I'm standing in the laundry room next to the washing machine, if the water in the sink is running, if the heat is on, if there's a Y in the day of the week, I can't understand him.

We can be sitting next to each other at the kitchen table and still misunderstand each other.

"Could you take out the garbage?" I ask.

"No."

"NO?"

"Oh, I thought you said "'Did you.'"

Our entire conversation goes that way some days.

When I ask him to repeat something, he says it EXTRA LOUD, WHICH IS UNNECESSARY AND IRRITATING.

Some of my friends say they're going through the same experience.

One co-worker said every night at dinner she says something, and her husband (who, by the way, is older than she and plays in a band), will say, "What?" just as she takes a bite. She chews, then repeats.

I was in a large, somewhat noisy room the other day, and I found myself reading the lips of a woman standing two feet away from me.

When I mentioned that I planned to go get a free hearing test, it was like a bunch of teenagers whispering about sex.

Everyone got excited. "Oh, really? Where is that? I need to go. Oh, yeah, that's great."

I'm getting so paranoid that I ask people to repeat themselves several times, especially if I'm interviewing someone on the telephone.

Is that "B" as in boy, or "V" as in victory?

Oh, "P" as in Paul.

My husband took a phone message for me recently. He wrote to call "Trisha." I called the number and ask for Trisha, and realized it was an acquaintance of mine named Janet. How he heard Trisha, I'll never know.

I'm getting to that point where I just laugh when someone says something I don't understand. I hear a word or two and try to make the connection.

Sometimes it's hours later when it dawns on me that they said, "My dog just died," instead of "My hair is fried."

My co-worker wants to be included on this hearing test trip.

She took a message at work the other day and thought the person said "Heritage Center," when the woman actually said she was calling from "a hearing center."

My friend just laughed to keep from crying.

I'm glad, because I can't hear over all that sobbing.

(Staff writer Tammy Keith can be reached by e-mail at tammy.keith@thecabin.net or by phone at 505-1238.)