Larry led us back up the temporary stairway leading from the cellar of the Petersen's suburban Seattle home, cautioning us to watch for the low beam. When we got upstairs, it may have been an optical illusion but his sturdy back looked stooped. He had just explained how he and some friends had dug a 10x18-foot wine cellar by hand, excavating 55 mini-truck loads of dirt which first had to be passed out in buckets.

Now he could sit back and enjoy some of the fruits of his labor with us and his wife, Leila--a bottle of pale amber 1976 German Auslese, one of the best vintages during the century. It was delicious, just what we needed to relax after the long cross-country flight and drive through rush-hour traffic. As we sipped the wine, Larry talked.

I've always liked wine but I didn't become a serious wine taster until 1977, when Leila went off to college to study for her master's degree and a teaching certificate. The school was 180 miles away and she came home only on weekends so I had to learn how to cook and started to read about wine. I got hooked.

I don't buy wine for the purpose of investment; I buy it as a pleasurable hobby. Perhaps we'll have company that appreciates wine and we'll cook some gourmet food to go with it. It wouldn't be right to serve everyday food with fine wine. So I've enjoyed learning about food and about wine that matches the food. It's really an art.

Usually I buy the wine from wine shops. There is one in Seattle that I go to most frequently because they have a wider selection than the other stores and they have better service. We write back and forth to communicate. If I have questions, I can write to them and they'll take the time to explain things to me. They have taught me a lot.

I joined a group called the Vintage Select, through which you can buy wine at a lower cost than in most stores. Sometimes I'll go to Portland to look for a special wine that I can't get in Seattle. If they have it, I'll buy it and bring it home but it's really against the law to bring more than one bottle of wine across the state line.

There is a wine tasting group that meets every other month to give people the opportunity to taste and compare different wines. Mostly, I'm self-taught. With the wine tasting group, almost all the people are hearing so I have to write back and forth to them. I also subscribe to several journals about wine.

As I said, I don't buy wine as an investment, but it is possible to make a little money. I can buy a case of wine and if it improves with age and goes up in value, I can sell it to a wine dealer and make a profit.

You can save money, especially on Bordeaux, the French red wine, if you buy it before it's been bottled and will not be bottled for several years. But you can taste it from the barrels and if it tastes like it has potential to improve, then you can place an order. Of course, I can't go to France myself to do this; I depend on the word of experts. So, I don't get it right away; they keep it for me for one or two years. For example, I ordered two bottles of Bordeaux at $11.99 a bottle and several years later, when I finally got them, they were worth $45 each. There was another wine that cost $19 when I put down the order and when I got it, it was worth $85. I wouldn't have been able to afford it if I had waited until it came out in bottles.

There is a high demand for Bordeaux while the supply is diminishing, which makes it valuable. I'm afraid to drink the expensive vintages. If I wait four or five years, then they may easily be worth $200.

I took a wine class once and if I take another, I could become a certified wine instructor. But I've never gotten around to taking that final class. Wine's just a hobby for me.

I have roughly 400 bottles down in the cellar. A while back, I had 250 bottles so my stock hasn't increased much. The reason is that back then wine wasn't too expensive, but the price has now gone up so much, I've bought less over the years. If the prices were the same as before, then I might have 1,000 bottles by now. Economically, wine can be very expensive.

You have to keep in mind that some wines are expensive just because of the name; they may cost $20 or $25 a bottle. The name isn't that important. What's important is the year. You have to know abouat vintages. Some wines that cost $5 or $6 may taste better than wine that costs $30. You have to be careful. I remember going to a wine affair where we chipped in to buy some champagne that cost $115. We got just a little sip of it to see what the opinion was. It was fair; it wasn't worth $115. So price doesn't always mean the quality is good.

We used to go to the wine club often, but we've been so busy lately. My wife has her new job and I've been busy building the wine cellar. We'll have more time for the club next year. From what I understand, it's the largest organization of its kind in the country.

Thank goodness, the wine cellar is almost finished. Last November, every evening after work, I would come home and work on shoveling it out. The temperature went down to as low as 15, which was unusual for late November. I got bronchitis as a result of back sweating. I was trying to get it done in time so that they could pour cement. I ended up digging out 55 truck loads of dirt which I carried away in my small pickup. I would dump it different places. If some friends wanted dirt, I would take it to them. Yes, it was hard work. I'm 49 and I'm surprised I didn't have a heart attack from all that work. Maybe the wine helped my heart. Who knows?

What's the most expensive wine that I've ever drank? I think it was a 1974 Beaulieu Vineyards Cabernet Savignon. It was a private reserve and we bought it for $10 in Leila's home state of Maine. It cost $22 here at that time. About five years later, we drank it and it was worth $45. If we still had it, it would be worth $70 now. But we enjoyed it; we won't live forever, you know.

Futures is mostly for red wine. When wine is first released, it's possible to buy it in what they call futures before it's released for sale. You try to buy it when it first comes out rather than waiting a few years because it will be too expensive then. Wine requires aging. It may take something like three to 20 years. You have to read up on the literature in the field to find out which are the good wines. Some take 15 to 20 years to age. You don't want to let it age too long as it may become weak. Well, not weak, what I mean is tired, flat, plummy. That's the challenge. There's always something to learn; you never feel like you've learned everything there is to know about wine. It's just like fly fishing; they're always coming up with new flies and how to make them. That's why I enjoy this hobby.

(Larry stopped to refill our glasses and held his up to the light.) Not bad, a little bit sweet, just right for an aperitif or dessert wine.

I was born deaf and grew up 30 miles north of here. I went to hearing schools and oral schools but I didn't learn how to speak and I'm not a good lipreader. When I was nine years old, my parents decided to send me to the residential school for the deaf in Vancouver. After that, I attended Gallaudet College, where I earned a B.A. in chemistry. I worked at Boeing Aircraft for nine years, after which I had a big change in life. I went to California State University, Northridge, where I was in the Leadership Training Program [for the] Deaf.

That experience changed my life. Before that time, I didn't have much self confidence but after that training, my motivation increased and I started to feel I could do things. I wasn't afraid to try new things. Even though I might make mistakes, I was willing to try. It really helped me to find out I could compete successfully with the hearing students in the group.

I'm currently working for the Seattle Central Community College, which has a program for the deaf. We have about 90 hearing impaired students. I work as an instructor and as a student adviser; also as a dormitory program coordinator.

I'm proud to be a part of the deaf community. I don't know what I'd do without the deaf community; it's very important to me and I identify strongly with it. I'm serving my third term as president of the Washington State Association of the Deaf.

We had a wonderful experience in the deaf community about three years ago. We started a grievance over the state-appointed official who was named president of the Washington School for the Deaf. He was less qualified than other applicants. We continued our protest until the governor rescinded the appointment. That showed us that we could do things when we had a good reason and confidence in our ability.

The most negative experience that I've had I think was when I was young and I'd come home from the school for the summer vacation and there would be only hearing people around. There was nobody I could talk to because communication was so difficult. I was always looking forward to going back to school where I could be with my friends.

Long ago, not many hearing people knew sign language but now many are taking classes and it's pleasant to be able to exchange small talk. Almost all the parents of deaf children in this state are learning sign language. I envy them. My parents are hearing and they didn't learn to sign until much later, but they are still wonderful parents. They are very uncommon compared to most hearing parents of deaf children.

'My favorite hobby is fishing. I like to fish for steelhead, salmon and trout. I use flies for trout fishing. I also like photography. I used to collect stamps and now I collect wine.

We have two deaf children. They are now grown; one is 21 and the other is 18. Time has gone by so quickly. We have a camper. We bought a camper instead of a tent because in Washington, it rains a lot and it gets the tents wet and it's hard on the children. The camper isn't all that big, but it can withstand the rains. We do a lot of traveling. See the pictures over on the wall? We have pictures of the children in different states as they were growing up. Sometimes we wish they were little again so we could travel around to more national parks as a family.

I think the deaf community will not only endure but become more active in the years ahead because there are more services for deaf people, more college programs, more technology like TDDs and decoders for closed captioned TV. You can see the changes all around you. I think all these changes have helped the deaf people to become stronger because we are in better touch with the hearing community and can keep in better touch with other deaf people.

The State is starting to recognize the special needs of deaf people but it's up to the deaf people to go to the State and let them know our needs and make sure they are met. Those deaf people who have a better education need to be willing to get involved. I don't mean to say that the well-educated deaf people do it just for others; we are doing it for ourselves, also. We're seeing more sophistication in the deaf community. We are becoming more politically aware, more deaf people are getting involved.

I remember before my wife went off to college to get her master's degree and a teaching certificate, her former boss, who had hired her as a teacher's assistant, told Leila that she couldn't become a teacher because she was deaf and couldn't speak. Later on, that same man was the one who encouraged her to get her master's degree and he was thrilled when he found out that she had become head of the department. It just shows that people's attitudes can change. But we can't expect attitudes to change overnight; we have to keep working in a positive way.

As president of the Washington State Association of the Deaf, I noticed that those people from the residential schools have good leadership skills while those from the mainstream programs seem not to know how to lead. They have potential, they're smart, but they haven't developed the leadership ability. They just don't have the opportunities in the mainstream schools. That's one reason we've encouraged the establishment of the Junior Washington State Association of the Deaf to help develop leadership potential. Taking this as an afternoon activity can be just as important as what happens in the classroom.

I've been very involved with my work as an instructor and I work at two different colleges, one in Seattle and one in Portland. I've been trying to find others to help with the WSAD. I remember a time when our membership was really increasing but over the last two years, it has leveled off, maybe even dropped a bit, so I'll have to work harder. One reason the WSAD grew in the past was that there were no service centers for the deaf and hard of hearing. Now we have four in the larger cities and people are getting more involved with these local organizations where in the past they used to be more involved in the state association. They now have their own fund raising activities.

But I think both the WSAD and the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) have a future. I remember when the NAD called for a national boycott of CBS for their lack of captioning. I made sure the information got out to all the deaf people in the state. Deaf people came from all over to join the protest and only a few were members of the NAD and WSAD. So the idea occurred to us, why not have the NAD set up an office of consumer affairs which would pull in more grass roots deaf people? A good thing about the NAD is it has a home office, which is better than before. The state association should also have a home office. We don't have one now, but in the future we would like to have one and hire a part-time director. That's our long-term goal.

Gail Hyde
Project Coordinator, Web Design