My second week at LCB

Hello everyone.  I meant to post this last Friday.  Sorry for the delay.  Will also have another one up soon.

 

Friday, November 13

Another week over, my second week at LCB, the training centre.

 

This week started off slow as I had a cold.  Unfortunately I missed one day of school because I couldn’t stop sneezing.  Of course the boys got it too.  I’m all for families sharing, but it’s too bad the sharing has to include germs.

 

My travel classes were much better this week.  I am starting to orientate myself  using audio and tactile cues.  I didn’t realize how much I used my limited vision to navigate and avoid, or not avoid obstacles!

Wearing a blind fold all day is allowing me to focus on the audio and tactile senses and learn to use them to their potential.  If you pay attention, these senses can tell you so much.  My instructor, Roland, and I walked down a few blocks from the centre.  I practiced finding the street crossings and keeping on the sidewalks.  I am gaining a reputation for veering into the street.  The street we are walking along is a quiet road, so it isn’t dangerous.  Roland says to me,” “so where do you think you are?”  I laugh and say “in the middle of the road?”

 

Funny how you can think you are walking straight when you are actually walking in a diagonal.  Walking at an angle is fine as long as you know how to recognize you are doing this and learn how to correct it.  I am learning to listen to the sounds of traffic on the parallel and perpendicular streets and feel the direction of the sun or feel the incline of a drive way to judge if I am walking straight.  If the cars suddenly sound like they are in front of me instead of to my left, then I am beginning to realize it isn’t the road that has magically changed position, but me.  I simply move my body back so the traffic sounds are again on my left, and then I continue on.  To experienced blind travelers, this probably sounds elementary, but when you aren’t used to using this kind of cue, it is liberating to become aware of it.  What a powerful feeling to be able to make travel decisions based on sound and touch rather than sight.  That is what the centre calls learning alternative techniques. 

 

Today I travelled with Arlene Hill, a travel teacher who has written several excellent articles about traveling as a blind person.  It is wonderful to work with blind people who are travel instructors.  It feels motivating to know that I can eventually become as competent as they are at getting around.

 

Another thing I am working on is called the “open palm technique;”  this is a technique of holding your cane.  It is tricky to do at first.  When I was little, I was taught to hold my cane with my index finger down the cane.  The open palm technique involves a loose rolling motion in the palm of your hand.  And you are not supposed to move your wrist.  The movement is all in the hand / fingers.  The thumb hovers over top.  At first it feels like the cane will fall out of your hand, but I am gradually getting used to it.

 

At LCB we are taught to tap the cane from side to side and not to do constant contact.  Apparently constant contact is for people who have neuropathy and may have a limited sense of touch.  Apparently the constant contact method can slow you down.  Interesting.

 

In shop this week I made another grid block.  I used a drill for the first time in my life and learned to use a drill bit.  I had heard the term “drill bit” before, but never knew what it was or what it did.

 

The drill is heavy and it takes all my strength to hold it in place.  I need to build some muscle!  I am looking forward to learning to use other tools like the table saw!

 

I made coffee yesterday in Home Ec., and today I made bacon and eggs.  Cooking in a frying pan is another thing I normally use my sight to accomplish.  It was neat to cook the whole meal under sleep shades.  I used tongs to turn the bacon, and listened to the sizzle of the bacon grow quieter, which told me it was time to flip it over.  I used round, metal devices, called egg rings, to fry the eggs.  These egg rings keep the egg in place, so you can locate it on the pan.  For once I didn’t burn the bacon and I ate my concoction for lunch!

 

After cooking anything at the centre, we do our dishes and put everything away. 

 

The Centre is putting on a Christmas play about Santa Clause losing his sight.  Santa is depressed about going blind.  He learns about the training centre in Ruston Louisiana and goes for training to become a competent and confident blind Santa.  I am in the quire.  Mr. Whittle the play writer says I can have a part in the big play at convention this summer.  It will be about a blind doctor.  Can’t wait.  I’ve been wanting to do some acting for a long time.

 

We have “seminar” twice a week.  Seminar is an opportunity for all students and staff to gather to discuss blindness issues and how to handle blindness in a positive way.  This week we watched a movie called “Blind Sight.”  This movie is about the blind man who climbed Mt. Everest  and how he worked with blind teenagers from Tibet to go on a climbing expedition.  It is an excellent movie.  In Tibet blindness is seen as evil and as a punishment for sin in a past life.  Certainly much negativity for these young people to overcome. 

The movie features, Sabrea, a blind woman from Germany, who travelled with a cane to Tibet and travelled on horseback into village to find blind children.  She started a school in Tibet called Braille Without Borders.  What an amazing person, not because she is blind, but because of what she is doing to empower blind people around the world.  Sabrea is a symbol that blindness has no boarders, and we all must unite to change what it means to be blind in this world.

 

Well, tomorrow a group of us are going to a flee market in Arcadia, 20 minutes from Ruston.  We are going in a bus and I am taking Rhys.  Will be good to spend some momma son time.

Lots of love to everyone.