She supposed that much of the curiosity and even contempt she felt for this man came from the fact that he had been able to master sign language so easily while it seemed so difficult for her. Here he was, an old man in a room full of young adults, a man in clothes that seemed almost as ancient as he was, while those around him dressed in their best. Everything about him was so out of place here. Why was this strange man here and how come he found learning sign language so easy while she found it so hard?

It had started out as a warm and sunny day. There had been a gentle breeze and a few clouds in the sky, but otherwise it was just another gorgeous late summer day. Tommy and his friends had asked if they could go swimming in the lake behind the house, like they did almost every day in the summer. She had said yes, almost automatically, not knowing that her answer would change Tommy's life forever.

She hadn't known there would be a storm. How could she? It was a freak storm that came out of nowhere, but still she blamed herself. Tommy had nearly died because she hadn't known. She should have done something different.

Tommy and the other children were playing at the lake. They loved to tie rafts together and then jump onto them. They wrestled and played all day long. Sometimes they would play cops and robbers, pretending to shoot each other by the shoreline, each trying to outdo each other at being a bigger ham than the next when it was their turn to pretend to fall and die. Who knew that soon, Tommy wouldn't be faking?

Here she was in the classroom, and yet again her eyes started to fill, as she thought of that day. Of her selfishness, her laziness, and how it had nearly cost her the son she loved so much would haunt her daily thoughts.

It all happened so fast. Oh sure, it started off slow enough, but once things took off, it was like being part of a nightmare where everything around you is moving at high speed, while your body seems mired in something sticky that makes you appear to move in slow motion.

She was sitting on the back porch sipping her tea while she watched the children play. Tommy had just turned twelve, and most of his friends were about the same age. She thought Tommy might even be having his first crush. There was a cute little girl, whose nickname was Skipper, who Tommy seemed to look at every time he thought no one was looking. She thought it was funny that Skipper had gotten her nickname from the boys, simply because she was able to skip rocks on the lake's surface better than any of the boys. Oh, they tried, but Skipper beat them eight times out of ten. Yes, it was a lovely day, with a cool breeze and some clouds to help ease some of the late summer heat. It was a wonderful day.

More clouds began to form. The wind picked up just a bit. Little waves formed on the water's surface. Still, it was really nothing to worry about. Even when the first raindrops fell, she was still unconcerned. Just a little summer shower. She would let the children play for a little while longer before calling them in. They were happy and she didn't want to spoil their fun. Not to mention that she didn't want to hear, "BUT MOM" It was simply easier to let them play than to call them inside, where they would have been safe and where Tommy would have been spared from this nightmare nor lost his hearing.

Damn, she couldn't concentrate on anything the teacher was saying! It was all playing out in her mind again, and the old man was still back there, never speaking, and yet his hands never stopped going through the motions.

Finally, it began to drizzle. She decided it was time to call them in. She hollered, "TOMMY, TIME TO COME INSIDE." Tommy and the kids turned to look at her, and Tommy did exactly what she had expected, yelling back, "BUT, MOM!" Two words that are the dread of every parent. Forget that you are trying to do the right thing, trying to do what is best for your child! No matter what you ask them to do, they always respond with those same two words. "BUT, MOM!" Listening to these most dreaded of all words was just a part of being a mother.

She yelled back, "Come on in kids, it's getting ready to rain." Tommy yelled back, "JUST FIVE MORE MINUTES?" Again, another phrase that children seem to learn from some magical source! Words that on one hand sound so whiny, and on the other, make a parent feel like a bad person if they don't relent. And even when she relented, she knew that in another five minutes Tommy and the other kids would again ask for five more.

When I think back, I realize that my motivation in letting them continue to play was partly selfishness on my part. As long as they were at the lake I could sit here and relax, enjoying the breeze, but when they came in, I would have to get towels, mop up the water on the floor, make lunch and do all the things that mothers do for their children. So part of me, the selfish part, had been happy to allow them to stay that extra five minutes.

The children seemed to play with renewed energy. Like these five minutes were the most important of their lives. Like these five minutes might be the last chance they would ever have to play again. How close that had come to being true. She envied them their ability to enjoy the simple things in life, things that adults somehow forgot how to enjoy, even as she worried about the darkening sky and the sprinkling of a few really big raindrops.

The wind began to gust as Tommy made one last climb up the tree which had no name, but mention "the tree" to any kid in the neighborhood and, out of the hundreds of trees in the neighborhood, all of the kids would automatically think of this one. It was a huge old oak tree. It leaned out from the shoreline, far out over the water. One of its branches had the traditional swinging rope tied to it. The kids would climb up onto one of the lower branches to get a little height then, holding the rope, they would jump towards the lake and for a few seconds they could fly. They would fly out over the surface of the lake in an arc, nearing the water's surface at the arc's lowest point, and then rising gloriously back into the air before letting go of the rope and falling back to the water's surface. Mom herself had snuck out to the tree a few months back when no one had been looking. She too had flown and loved every minute of it.

She called, "Tommy, come on in. Your five minutes are up!" But Tommy was looking at Skipper, and hamming it up as he said, "I'll slay the dragon for you, Princess." Skipper was watching him with adoring eyes, as though he were a knight in shining armor riding into the face of danger, rather than a little boy getting ready to jump from a tree. Tommy grabbed the rope and jumped, yelling, "I'm gonna kick some dragon butt." Skipper called out, "My hero!" And I called out "TOMMMEEEEE..."

In seconds my whole little world turned from almost a storybook life with my son, into a nightmare of the worst kind. As Tommy jumped into the air, the dragon spoke. Not a real dragon. The storm. Lightning crashed into the tree. The whole world exploded into light and there was a deafening roar of thunder. There was no delay between the lightning strike and the thunder. We were too close for that. It all came as one big explosion. One minute Tommy was jumping from the tree, the next there was a boom and an explosion of light. I was blinded for only a second, but that was the longest second of my life, not knowing what had happened to my son.

As I regained my vision, I could see the top of the tree was on fire, although the flames lasted only a few seconds. The branch that Tommy had been hanging from was gone, and so was Tommy.

The day turned suddenly dark as clouds blacked out the sun. My son had simply disappeared from the world. Children were screaming and crying as they ran for home and the safety of their parent's arms. As they ran from the lake, I ran towards it, screaming out my son's name over and over.

The lightning strike had ripped off the branch that Tommy had been hanging from. It now lay in the water. There was no sign of Tommy. He might be unconscious or even dead, trapped under the water by the tree branch. The rain was coming down in torrents now. It was black as midnight and somewhere, my son, if he was being held under water by that tree branch, had less than two minutes to live.

I did the only thing I could do, screaming his name as I jumped into the water. I tried groping along the branch looking for him and then realized that Tommy would not be on top of the branch, he would be under it. There was no one to help me find my son. By the time the parents of the neighbor children could return to help, it would already be too late. If I did not find my son right now, he was going to die.

So I took a deep breath and dived under the water. It was nearly an impossible tangle of branches under the water. There was no way I was going to find him. Even as I struggled to pull myself down through the branches, I cried futilely. My son was as good as dead and I had killed him. And then a miracle happened. I felt Tommy's hand in the darkness. It was limp and lifeless, and that scared me more than anything so far.

I don't know how I did it. It's all a blur now. I remember struggling to drag Tommy out from under the tree. Part of me was worried that pulling him through those branches might hurt him, but a bigger part realized I had no choice. If I did not get Tommy to the surface and air he would die. All I can remember is that it was dark, I didn't even know which way was up, but that somehow I managed to pull Tommy through the branches and to the surface.

The next thing I remember is waking up in the hospital.

They told me that Tommy was alive. That he was unconscious, but it looked as though he was going to live. They told me that I had saved my son's life. Not only had I dragged him out from under the tree, but that I had dragged him to the beach. That, despite having little air left in my own lungs, I had given him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, breathing my last gasps of breath into his lungs. They told me that when a neighbor arrived and took over, I had simply collapsed, unconscious from lack of oxygen myself.

They told me that although Tommy would live, he would never hear again. They said that between the closeness of the lightning strike and the resulting thunder, followed by a long submergence underwater, Tommy's eardrums had been damaged.

The newspapers said I was a hero. The neighbors said they were proud of me. My son said he loved me. But when I try to say something to my son, and he gives me a blank look, my eyes fill with shame.

The very least I can do is to learn sign language so that I can talk to my son. So here I sit, trying to learn what seems impossible. To learn to talk with my hands. To make a series of complicated moves that somehow becomes a language. Tommy has mastered sign language. Indeed, his face is so full of expression that often he need not say anything.

I study and study and still, am probably at the level of a kindergartner. And yet, in the back of the class is the old man who seems so strange and out of place in his worn out old clothes, who seems to have become the Zen master of sign. I wonder sometimes if he can even hear, if maybe he himself is deaf and somehow ended up in the wrong classroom. So today I have decided to follow him. To find out why this old man comes to our class. To find out why he is learning sign. Partly to discover why he is able to learn what I can't. And to be honest, part of me wants to find out if he is up to no good.

He is always the last to class. He comes in late and sits in the back of the room. He is always the first to leave. The class is three hours long and he always leaves half an hour early. So today when he leaves, I will follow him.

I glance at him from time to time, watching him making the hand motions, a smile on his face, and yet, for some reason, his mere presence makes me uncomfortable. What is it about him that makes him seem so out of place here? It just makes no sense to me that someone of his age would just now be learning to do sign language.

Finally, he moves to leave. I wait just a minute and then I get up to go, too. I feel conspicuous, like everyone is looking at me, but in reality no one seems to notice me; they are too busy struggling to learning to sign a particularly difficult word.

I head out into the hallway. I'm not worried about Tommy. His classes end before mine and he is out playing in the park with the other kids. It's wonderful to watch him with the other children. He fits in there. Not like at a regular school where some of the older kids might have made fun of him, telling jokes behind his back. Making fun of him, thinking he does not know what they are saying, none of them wise enough to know that he can read their lips and expressions. Kids will be kids and he accepts it, but I am the one who finds comfort in Tommy being with children who, like him, are deaf.

The old man heads out the door, but I need not rush to catch up. After all, he walks with a cane. So I give it another minute and then I walk out front, too. But he's gone. He has disappeared. I look at the parking lot but there is no car pulling out. There is no little old man with a cane at the bus stop and there are no cars on the road. Where did he disappear to? I stand there for a few minutes just watching and listening, but he doesn't magically reappear.

Finally, I turn and head around the side of the building and through the tree-lined lane to the park. Tommy generally meets me out front, but I'm early, so today I decide to go watch him play at the park.

That's when I spotted the old man with the cane again. He's also heading to the park. He heads for a bench and sits down in the shade. He pulls out a little white bag and sets it on the bench next to him. I had forgotten about the little white bag that always sits on his desk in the classroom. I see it every day. It seems so out of place, and yet, until this moment, I had forgotten about it.

I think maybe it's his lunch. But he makes no move to eat it. Then a pigeon appears. It lands on the sidewalk next to him, makes a cooing noise and then hops up on the bench next to him. Soon other pigeons begin to arrive. Now I understand what the white bag is for; it's full of food for the pigeons. The birds seem to know this man. He has done nothing. He sat the bag down, but never reached into it, yet pigeons are now arriving from all over the park. It's almost magical the way they appear, and yet the old man makes no move to feed them. It's all so very strange.

Then I get the shock of my life. From behind a tree, I watch as my son runs up and hugs the little old man and calls him Grampa. Then the other children come running, too. The pigeons scatter but quickly re-gather. The little old man signs to my son and the other children: Hello. The best I can tell, he appears to greet each child by their name in sign language. It's a curious scene, an old man talking to children and they to him, while not a single word is spoken, except for that first "Grandpa", and that from my own son. All of this while the pigeons look on.

My son looks so happy when the old man reaches for the bag and holds it out to him. Tommy gently reaches into the bag and grabs a handful of pigeon food, then each of the other children does the same. They fan out in a circle and the children feed the birds. The pigeons turn into pigs with wings as they chow down on the food, making me think that just maybe today pigs will fly. The children giggle and laugh even though they can't hear the sound of their own voices. And the old man just sits there smiling.

Finally the children run off to play and the old man is alone. I walk up to him with tears in my eyes. This old man, who I had thought badly about, had brought a smile to the face of my son and all his friends. I realized that every day while I was in class learning how to speak to my son in sign, this kind man was out here talking to him, and indeed, to all of the children.

I sat down next to him and started to sign. He looked at me, smiled and then eventually started laughing. I tried to sign, but he waved me off and laughedsome more. Finally he said, "I can hear. You don't have to use sign language." I realized I had never heard him speak before, so I had just assumed that he was deaf.

There was a lot of hemming and hawing on my part but finally I told him that I had followed him, that I had been curious about where he went every day before class ended, and why he was learning sign language.

What he said touched my heart, like nothing in my life has ever before and possibly ever will. He told me that for years he had come to the park to feed the pigeons. The pigeons were his friends and he knew them all by name. When the school for the deaf had opened and had started allowing the kids to play in the park after classes, the children had come out to play, but other than each other, there had been no one for them to talk to. One day, my son had some over and tried to talk to him while he was feeding the pigeons. He realized my son could speak but couldn't hear his replies. He said he had done his best, but failed miserably. He had realized that Tommy and all of the children, while they had each other, were lonely. They wanted an adult to talk to.

So he started going to the school to learn sign. He practiced day and night. The classes were okay, but each day, after they fed the pigeons, the children would hold a class to teach him new words. The children were the teachers and he was the student. It gave them a chance to feel good about themselves. Soon they had begun calling him Grampa, a name that he cherished with all of his heart.

He told me his story: how his family had died many years before when his home had burned to the ground, and then I told him mine. I told him how I blamed myself, of my feelings of guilt. I broke down and cried in the arms of this kindly gentleman. I sobbed and sobbed. When I was done, he looked me in the eyes and said, "When my family died, I tried to find ways to blame myself, too, but the truth is that sometimes in life things just happen without any reason. What happened to Tommy is not your fault. In fact, your son has found a new life, which in some ways is making him a better person. He has learned to understand people instead of just listening to their words."

I realized he was right. Children who could hear might never have taken the time to talk to an old man who sat on the bench feeding the pigeons. My son's world was not gone, it had simply changed. While he had lost his hearing, he had also gained an insight into people's hearts.

And right then, some of my guilt -- not all of it, but some -- disappeared. For the first time since that horrible night, I smiled from ear to ear. We sat there on the bench watching the children play. My son Tommy never looked so happy. I invited Grampa to join us for dinner, to which he graciously agreed.

Finally, I asked him how I could learn to communicate with my son the way he did. He said, "Let Tommy and the other children teach you."

MORAL OF THE STORY

Never judge a book by its cover
Never judge a person by appearances
Never blame yourself for what you cannot change
Never pass up an opportunity to learn from your children