Alandra's Lilacs by Tressa Bowers

Author:Tressa Bowers
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781563681554
Publisher: Gallaudet University Press

The next year, just as school was letting out for the summer, Tom got the promotion he worked so hard for. He was made manager of a new home improvement store in Orlando, Florida. We were all very excited about the move, but we were in Florida only three months when he got a second promotion to the company's home office in Fort Worth, Texas. So Landy began her next school year in Fort Worth.

We were pleased with Landy's new school. The public school system's deaf program was headed by Bill Moffat. He was loud and friendly, and the kids all loved him. Bill got to know each parent and each child; he listened to what each had to say. He had been very successful with main-streaming deaf children into hearing classes. There were only a dozen or so kids in the program with her, and they seemed like a bright, intelligent group. Most had been in the program since they had started school. We were most impressed by Bill's dedication to serving the deaf children whose education he had been entrusted with.

Landy, who was now twelve and quite grown up, wanted to have a talk with us just before starting school. Since no one in her new school knew her by the name Landy, she wanted to leave her baby name behind, along with what she felt was her childhood. Landy was an endearing name, we told her. But she thought Alandra sounded so much more sophisticated. We accepted her request and tried very hard never to call her Landy again. Try as we might, on occasion we slipped and called her Landy in front of her friends. This was met at first with confusion, and her friends would ask, “Who's Landy?” When the pet name was explained, their confusion was followed by laughter and good-hearted embarrassment from the very “grown up” Alandra.

I always admired Alandra's ability to make friends easily with both hearing and deaf kids. Her speech was easy to understand and many of her hearing friends learned sign language very well. This was a very fortunate asset because during the summer months Alandra was mostly cut off from her deaf friends. Tom and I had not thought to get involved with the deaf society and they did not seek us out; it's a problem that still exists. Part of the problem was that the deaf kids from her school were bused in from all over the city. Because of my long work hours, I was usually not available to take her to meet with her school friends, and they were all still too young to drive themselves. So she made friends with hearing kids from our neighborhood. Our home often had extra kids visiting and Alandra visited their homes as often as she was allowed.

I was offered a manager position in a J.C. Penneys jewelry department, and accepted the job even though it meant difficult hours. Fortunately, the state's “blue law” meant that all retail stores in Texas were closed on Sundays.

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