So, there is this guy on campus, he’s blind and very, very mobile. Every once and awhile I see him waiting for the campus shuttle in the morning but more often I see him walking to his classes. I’m completely amazed as well as inspired by this man. He lives in the apartments right across from me and housing was kind enough to put him on the 2nd floor (pretty disgusting). I see this guy everywhere, coming back from classes, going to classes, at campus center, random places on campus.
Alone he walks, and alone I observe, I find myself watching him like a mother watches her child get on their bike without training wheels for the first time, or a grant holder watches a test subject. Every time I’m equally as amazed as the first time I watched. His ability to guide and find himself using his guide stick is unparalleled to anything I’ve seen a human do before. He knows exactly where he is, and when I skated by him once I immediately was worried that I would hit his guide stick and mess something up, possibly hurt him but instead he just put it right in front of him and stood completely still. His other senses are obviously more in tuned with his environment than say, yours or mine would be; which I’ve learned in my past but this was amazing he knew I was coming before I saw him in front of me!
My heart pounds at the site of this guy, no matter what I’m doing I lose all focus and I just pour my sympathy in his direction. I’ve heard that people in his position do not like this, people fixed in chairs hate when people try to help them with a simple task that is made harder to them solely because they are in a chair. They do not want to be sympathized, it makes sense, if I’m sick or injured I don’t want help, I want to believe that I am still fully independent. I see him though and I imagine my life without vision, its one of my biggest fears. But what if I’ve never seen anything, perhaps he was born that way and he has never been able to see the beautiful clear teal color of a wave face, or the beauty of the place he lives in, the rain, the colors of the world and the beauty of everything in it. I’m very thankful for everything I’ve seen, I know that if I lost my sight tomorrow I would be greatly saddened but I could find peace in knowing that I have been blessed with the ability to see a lot of different things, some I wish I could forget and others I wish I could remember more vibrantly nevertheless I was given the chance to SEE them.
I caught myself praying the first time I watched him walk by in the opposite direction of me, “hey God, I just want to thank you for everything you’ve given me and blessed me with in my life…” and then I stopped because I made I a horrible mistake. Was I really being that naive to infer that because I have an additional sense that ables me to visualize my surroundings that I am somehow more blessed? No way I thought, and so I watch him and watch that he is not scared, he’s not sad, he walks with his head up and I hope that he knows he is still blessed. He is blessed with waking up every day with the gift of life, the gift of mobile legs and most definitely a more profound knowledge of the world than I perhaps never will. For all I know, he may be a lot happier than I, and I truly hope he is.
I admire his spirit, it’s beautiful. I catch myself complaining over simple things like the university not funding a library to be open during the weekend, and here this guy is living on the 2nd floor of a building and having to go up and down stairs numerous times because the university lacked the common sense to give him a break. He’s not mad at the world, he obviously didn’t complain because I’m sure they would have made a switch by this late into the year if he had. It hits home for me when I watch him, I feel like a small part of me connects to him on a more personal level than the average on looker. As I should be fixed to a chair with zero movement from the neck down just as much as I should be walking around with full movement. One tiny window was all that separated me from two completely polar lifestyles. I think about it every time I see him and it freaks me out to be honest, just thinking about how different my life would be, how many things I would never have experienced, how different my parents’ and sisters lives would be. All the people that have shaped me to who I am today, I would have never even met them. I can’t stand being sick because I refuse to be kept in for too long of time, I moved to Hawaii where I could run around year round and not have to be kept indoors, how radical of a change it would be if I couldn’t go outside without the push of my father, mother or sisters where my vision would be limited to what is in front of my face because turning my head would be out of the question.
I don’t know, this is very informal writing of me, not more normal style but it’s just random thoughts that I’m writing. But I really want to be this guy’s friend. I want to just ask him if he’d like someone to walk with to his class, I could talk him through the way and quicken his pace. But I don’t want him to get mad and think I’m just another guy throwing a pity card his way you know? He knows where he is every step along the way, and maybe he likes it that way, if I was there talking him through it could throw off his internal map and scare him as he might not know where he was at that exact moment… I just wish that the world wasn’t as real as it has to be I guess… stupid I know but it’s really sad sometimes =/
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