Ow!

February 1, 2008

My little portable headphones bit the dust. A freaky accident involving the edge of a door severed the cable and left them completely useless. It is a sad state of affairs.

When Santa’s elves built me a swanky new iPod “Classic” (the whole planet is conspiring to make me feel perpetually obsolete, or old-fashioned, or both) it of course came with a pair of those dreadful white headphones. Almost tossed ‘em. Glad I didn’t.

Sort of.

The sound is OK, all things considered, but the shocking thing is how transparent they are. All kinds of outside sounds were permitted to just waft right through them.

I’ve been listening to headphones for almost 25 years. I can remember my first portable, a simple radio, from at least 23 years ago - I got it when I was still living in Enfield, CT. What a long, strange trip its been since then: countless cassette walkmans, discmans, a few iPods, and more different kinds of headphones than I could possibly recall.

I am, believe it or not, very concerned about what that has meant for my ears.

However, I have clear confirmation that at the very least the headphone style I use now - the closed-ear type with the little ear canal gaskets - has been blocking out amazing amounts of everyday noise. Riding the subway this morning with the regular headphones I couldn’t believe how loud the blue line is! I almost feel like the Apple headphones made everything worse. I eventually gave up.

But I was intrigued by the intensity of the sounds around me and the cross-the-frontal-lobe tightness that I felt until I was above ground again. That never happens on my commute, even with music. Am I suggesting that I am in fact protecting my hearing by using the ‘Pod? Well, no, but… sort of. There’s no question that I have to carefully monitor the volume level, as it is so easy to forget where you are and crank it up a bit too much.

However, coming in to work this morning I could feel the difference. The blue line tunnel under the harbor is always a noisy affair - today it felt like thunder - and Government Center with its sharp corners leaves you wincing in agony as you savor the tones of shrieking steel-on-steel. It was horrible and oppressive - and that’s no way for sound to be.

I was going to wait - I didn’t really want to spend the money right now - but I think my lunch hour today will see me paying a visit to Audio Lab in Harvard Square to see if they still sell my headphones.

The health of my ears is at stake!

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