[humanser] There But for the NFB Go I

[Ericka]

Can you believe that the only people that get services in Wisconsin our children and the elderly? Once you were 21 you don't get training, good training, until you are in your 60s. It's all staying in your home so it's very simplistic and they push magnifiers and CCTV's on people.

Ericka Short
1750 Fordem Ave. #508
Madison. WI. 53704
608-665-3170

 from my iPhone 6s

> On Nov 26, 2016, at 12:14 PM, Merry Schoch via HumanSer <humanser at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 
> Hi JD and all,
> 
> Sadness is my reaction! I am not sure how services are for the elderly in this man's area but I know services for the elderly in Florida are so minimal I can only presume that he has not been introduced to the tools that can help in many of the ways he feels helpless.  He spoke of not being able to read the newspaper; is it safe to assume he has not been introduced to Newsline or possibly not in a way that makes him feel he can adequately use it? 
> 
> I have met some sharp elderly individuals; however, cognition may be an element that cause some elderly people using this service to find it unusable. I recently had the privilege to attend the affiliate of Texas' state convention and they had a program called "Silver Bells" that appeared to be focused on training elderly individuals with Newsline.  They may have offered more but I did not attend the workshop so I cannot speak to much more. Jonathan Franks, our division secretary and a state board member of TX, may be able to share if anyone is interested. 
> 
> The KNFB reader would be a great tool for reading text or computer training so the elderly could scan and read their own mail. However, where do the elderly go to receive training and funding for the equipment they need to aid them in basic living skills? I don't believe that the funding agencies believe that reading the mail, recipes, etc. are basic living skills. I remember saying to my DBS counselor when I first became blind, "I am using the television so I know approximately what time it is based on programming ". I was then sent a talking watch which I thought, at the time, was the greatest thing ever! How different I am today because losing my eyesight was a whole lot different than being blind! I hope this becomes the reality of this soul which seems to be so depressed and isolated due to his loss of eyesight.
> 
> Recently, I attended a training on trauma where the presenter told the audience of therapist that an elderly person who loses their eyesight can be traumatized by the experience. I took it upon myself to share that the research I have read produced results that isolation is the greatest variable that causes depression in the elder who has lost their eyesight. During a break I was then approached by an elderly blind therapist who asked me how I stayed so positive. I told her about my practice, other things I do, and that I am  living the life I want. Her reply was, "Well, I am doing all those things too", so I pondered to myself what is she missing.  I did not have the time to explore her negativity regarding blindness but I extended an invitation to a chapter meeting. Hopefully, our paths will cross again and I can be the positive role model for her to want to come to a chapter meeting. I'll keep inviting and as a social worker I will strive to "meet her where she is" with some positive philosophy of blindness intermingled.  May wee find those who need us and may we be the hope they need. 
> 
> Wishing you, JD, and all on this listserv a happy and joyous holiday season!
> 
> May you all be filled with the love, energy, hope, and determination of the National Federation of the Blind!
> 
> Warmly,
> Merry Christmas Schoch, LCSW  
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: HumanSer [mailto:humanser-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of JD Townsend via HumanSer
> Sent: Friday, November 25, 2016 7:54 PM
> To: Human Services Mailing List
> Cc: JD Townsend
> Subject: [humanser] There But for the NFB Go I
> 
> That’s my reaction.  What’s yours?
> 
> 
> 
> New York Times Sunday Review Desk Section 
> 2016 11 20
> 
> 
> 
> 
> DISABILITY  
> 
> Feeling My Way Into Blindness.  
> 
> By EDWARD HOAGLAND.  
> Edward Hoagland is a nature and travel writer, and the author, most recently, of 'In the Country of the Blind,' a novel
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Blindness is enveloping.  It's beyond belief to step outside and 
> see so little, just a milky haze.  Indoors, a smothering dark.  
> It means that you can't shed a mood of loneliness with a brisk 
> walk down the street because you might trip, fall and break 
> something.  Nor will you see a passing friend, the sight of whom 
> could be as cheery as an actual conversation.  Sights, like 
> sounds, randomly evoke a surge of memories ordinarily 
> inaccessible that lighten and brighten the day.  'Who are you? I 
> may already have asked 10 people who have spoken to me.  Their 
> body language as well as their smiles are lost to me.  Human 
> nature is striped with ambiguities, and you need to see them, but 
> like a prisoner, I am hooded.
> 
> I lost my sight once before, to cataracts, a quarter-century ago, 
> but it was restored miraculously by surgery.  It then went 
> seriously bad again, until, reaching 80, I needed a cane.  Tap, 
> tap.  Ambulatory vision is the technical term..
> 
> Everything becomes impromptu, hour by hour improvised.  Pouring 
> coffee so it doesn't spill, feeling for the john so you won't pee 
> on the floor, calling information for a phone number because you 
> can't read the computer, or the book.  Eating takes considerable 
> time since you can't see your food.  Feeling for the scrambled 
> eggs with your fingers, you fret about whether you appear 
> disgusting.  Shopping for necessities requires help.  So does 
> traveling on a bus.
> 
> The kindness of strangers is proverbial -- a woman leads me 
> through the bustle of an airport toward the taxi stand, a 
> waitress hands me back a $50 bill I mistook for a 20.  Blindness 
> is factually a handicap, yet an empathetic one, because other 
> people can so easily imagine themselves suffering from it, 
> sometimes even experiencing a rehearsal for it when stumbling 
> through a darkened house at night.  I remember how in school we 
> teased students with Coke-bottle glasses, but didn't laugh at 
> blind folk whose black glasses signified that they couldn't see 
> at all.
> 
> I know about handicaps harder to cotton to, having stuttered 
> terribly for decades, my face like a gargoyle's, my mouth 
> flabbering uncontrollably.  Blindness is old hat.  In Africa you 
> still see sightless souls led about by children gripping the 
> other end of a stick.  Blindness in its helplessness reassures 
> the rest of us that that oddball is not an eyesore or a loose 
> cannon.  Being blind is omission, not commission; and you'd 
> better learn how to fall.  Paratrooper or tumbler training would 
> be useful.  A tumbler can tip sideways as he lands so his hip and 
> shoulder absorb the blow.
> 
> The ears need schooling as a locator.  I search for the bathroom 
> at night, guided by a ticking clock whose location I recognize.  
> As you go blind, exasperating incongruities arise, but also the 
> convenience of this new excuse for shedding social obligations 
> not desired.  And you can give your car away.
> 
> Hearing snatches of conversation from invisible voices, 
> everything becomes eavesdropping. Have I seen my last movie? Is 
> the vision gone from television? But I can still see daylight and 
> bipedal forms, tree crowns and running water, swirling, seething 
> leaves against the sky-blue heavens, which remind me of 80 years 
> of previous gazing on several continents.  Eternal instants on 
> Telegraph Hill, Beacon Hill, or Venice and Kampala.
> 
> Splendiferous mountain vistas of greensward and cliffs scaffold 
> my dreams, drawn from memories of sheep pastures in Sicily and 
> Greece, rich with textured sedges or tinted canyons, then 
> bombastic skyscrapers, or Matisse's Chapel.  So it's 
> flabbergastingly impoverishing to wake up in the morning.  Faces 
> are no longer seamed, nor are raindrops stippled on the 
> windowpane, cats high-tailed in a turf war, postage stamps 
> vividly illustrative.  I forget my condition and grope for my 
> glasses, wherever they are, as if they could solve the emergency.  
> Blindness is an emergency; the window shades are drawn, and one 
> deals with it in myriad ways.
> 
> Instinctively I reach out to touch everyone I talk with, 
> heightening the moment of contact.  Shoulders I go for, as 
> gender-neutral, companionable territory, but most folks don't 
> want to chat for long with anyone whose deficits are front and 
> center.  There's sympathy fatigue, though allowances must be 
> made, an elbow gripped, and perhaps the menu read aloud in a 
> restaurant.  Poor guy; be considerate; tell him what the 
> headlines were in the paper today, but if he's not Helen Keller, 
> let the next person take a turn at being nice.
> 
> You get somebody to scan your mail for you outside the post 
> office, and supervise paying a bill in the return envelope, maybe 
> even writing the check for you to sign.  Improvising keeps one 
> alive, and at the beach you can hear the surf thump if not exult 
> in the spindrift's curl.  The tide tugs your feet.  At 4:30 in 
> midsummer you hear the birds' morning chorus, nature primeval and 
> ascendant.  You dig when you're blind, fingering for roots, then 
> for what the roots are connected to.  Curiosity does tip into 
> tediousness, though, when there's no new material.
> 
> Blindness as a metaphor is not flattering.  Blind drunk, a parent 
> blind to the misery of her children, a politician blind to the 
> needs of his constituents.  When blind you can neither read text 
> nor frowns, but if somebody starts talking to you and you can't 
> see them, hang loose till you figure it out.  Equilibrium is the 
> key.
> 
> Eyedrops of several descriptions and optical devices accumulate 
> as each is superseded by another.  You used different hand lenses 
> for different phases of magnification.  Since a book or film is 
> not in the cards, blindly groping for succor in your boredom can 
> be a danger.  That comfy stranger on the bench may be Mr.  Ponzi.  
> Discipline is required.  In all your parts, do you still enjoy 
> being alive? Crossing your legs and twitching an ankle, savoring 
> cherry tomatoes, then sweet corn and lobster.
> 
> Nights can turn bright if the world mysteriously whitens, as 
> though one's optic nerves were rebelling.  It's odd when one part 
> of the body dies but the rest does not.  In blindness we don't 
> cast off our eyes, but continue to consult them in thwarted ways, 
> much as amputees feel their lost parts almost function.
> 
> Feeling a chill wind, I'll look at the sky for a forecast, but 
> triangulate the slanting breezes for the message I can't see.  I 
> smell the rain before it comes, and the sun speaks to my skin 
> like a finger stroking.  As, in my view, joy in people may be 
> analogous to photosynthesis in plants, this is quite logical.  
> But wet days can be delicious also, a cool drink for dry skin, 
> restful in its implications; good weather has its pressures.  
> Less is expected of a rainy day; you can hole up a bit with 
> yourself.
> 
> Like Plato's Cave, your brain consists of memories flickering on 
> a wall.  The phenomenalities of sight are now memories, but my 
> sixth sense has helped.  Call it intuition; and I've never felt 
> despair, any more than when I was a kid who couldn't talk.  
> Blindness resembles a stretched-out stroke.  Functions wither as 
> your walking slows.  Muscles atrophy and sensibilities, too.  You 
> can't size up a new visage, yet the grottoes in your head have 
> more to plumb if your sight was lost midlife or later.  You can 
> go caving.
> 
> Where are my eyes, I suddenly think, as if I'd left behind my 
> coat.  Landscapes become impressionistic, eliding details.  
> Abbreviation is at the core.  Input is so precious -- the 
> conversations other people pause to grant you, beyond the barest 
> niceties, describing piquant scenery you can't see.  Strong 
> sunlight is needed for a newsstand headline but muted 
> illumination has subtler uses, and in pitch dark a blind man is 
> at an advantage.
> 
> The personality of the street, hubbubed with hurry, invites 
> strolling.  Slatted fences, orange lilies, SALE signs in a 
> window.  'Outta sight! a guy exclaims.  I seek a bench I know 
> about, remembering a whole gallery of friends who have died by 
> now.  Older than Mozart, younger than Bach, they engulfed my life 
> with love and commitment, and on a good day permeate my mind.  My 
> sexual fantasies invoke an alloy of wives and friends.  But 
> anonymity has swallowed me like Jonah's whale; I grope inside.
> 
> Sunlight beams turn the street radiant for a quarter-hour.  Two 
> of my mentors ended their lives by suicide, and I remember their 
> dilemmas sympathetically.  One jumped into the sea, the other the 
> Mississippi, but I wonder in each case whether the sun was 
> shining or they'd waited for a rainy day.  Our elements return, 
> in any event, to the oceans to re-form as other life.
> 
> Nature is our mother, if no longer our home.  We couch-surf in 
> rented beach houses, with green belts as habitat for other 
> creatures that remain.  How many of us have watched a possum 
> 'play possum' or a goshawk swoop after a blue jay? We feed 
> pigeons and hummingbirds, then have done with it.  Nature has 
> become a suburb.  Of course I can't see the cardinal at the 
> feeder out the window, though tidal forces still operate.  The 
> leaves natter even if you can't see them.  Your ears report their 
> bustle, ceaseless until dormant for a span of moments.  The pulse 
> in your throat signals that in your torso all is well; it will 
> beat till it quits.  That concordance of organs lives within us 
> like sea creatures throbbing on a coral reef, strung there as on 
> our skeleton as long as conditions allow.
> 
> Novelty is the spice of life and salts our daily round even when 
> we lose our sight.  Your eyes don't steer you as you saunter, yet 
> your lungs, legs, arms feel as fit as ever.  For simple exercise, 
> I hoist myself out of each chair, or bicycle in bed, though then 
> unfortunately may pick up two completely different shoes and try 
> to squeeze them on.  My socks don't match either.  But why am I 
> not crankier? a friend asks.  I'm helpless; I can't be cranky.  
> Blindness is enforced passivity.  I have become a second-class 
> citizen, an object of concern.  Crankiness won't persuade people 
> to treat me thoughtfully.  Disabled, that dry term once applied 
> to so many others over my lifetime, now applies to me.  As best I 
> can, I'll make my peace with it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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