quantity is quality?

Whenever i tell one of my Deaf instructors, "I grew up near Washington, D.C.," the first thing they say is always along the lines of, "There's a GREAT Deaf community there." it didn't occur to me until recently to wonder what the implications of this are for the Deaf community here. one of my teachers will usually comment on the small size and different quality of this community, and say it's good, but nothing like D.C. this is one of those things that i understand in ASL but can't quite translate to English. there is definitely a relationship between the size of the community in D.C. and its perceived quality: in a sense, bigger seems to be better. but that doesn't mean the community here is not strong Deaf, or that there aren't good people in it.

then i thought, it must be like going from a town where you're the only gay person to a city where there are thousands, and where so many connect with each other and build relationships and form community. and it's such an impressive thing, really, to know that There Are Others Like You. there are people who will understand you without a tremendous amount of effort, whether that's compromising between two different languages or having to [re]define parts of a [supposedly] shared one. a [queer/Deaf] community of two people is still a community, but you can only speak that language with each other; it's a relief to know that you may run into someone by chance with whom you can communicate effortlessly.