[nabs-l] cane travel trip 2

[Ashley Bramlett]

Jim,
For orientation, a few more comments on landmarks.
Something like the slope of the ground  is a landmark.
With practice you might feel the difference in texture from concrete to 
asphalt to indicate its a street.
Landmarks can also be  objects like poles or mail boxes.
Scents help too.  Maybe there's the smell of certain flowers near your home.
Everyone suggests compass directions.  You can try that.  But that didn't 
help me too much unless I was walking east or west during the daytime on a 
sunny day.
Cardinal directions were just hard to understand.
After high school I had an O M instructor come to my house to pick me up and 
practice mobility and get oriented to campus prior to the semester 
begginning.  After all in school I wanted to focus on academics not 
orientation.  Anyway, she talked about compass directions.  She also talked 
about landmarks and listening to traffic for orientation.  She was not in 
NFB using structured discovery officially but she was excellent I thought. 
I just say this to show that a non NFB instructor can have positive 
attitudes and use concepts similar to those NFB instructors have.

Ashley
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jim Reed" <jim275_2 at yahoo.com>
To: "MAB List" <mt-blind at nfbnet.org>; "NABS mail list" <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, June 12, 2009 3:15 AM
Subject: [nabs-l] cane travel trip 2


Hey all,
The mobility part is easy, its the orientation part that is going to be hard 
to master. I decided to wear my sunglasses at night to make it more 
challenging, I think sunglasses are a good compramize to sleepshades at 
night, at least for now while Im trying to learn the basics. With the 
sunglasses on, I got turned around once, and then overshot my house by two 
blocks. When I got lost I took off my sunglasses and was able to find my 
way. I'm still trying to figure out how I got turned around the first time. 
I ended up heading west when I wanted to go east. I realized my mistake when 
I was walking past my gym in the wrong direction. If I hadn't passed the 
gym, I'd be one county over by now. Oh, by the way, large parking lots are a 
pain as well. As are streets without sidewalks. and very large sidewalks. 
and wheel chair accessable curbs that allow you to breeze into the street 
without knowing your in the street until you run into the curb on the other
 side (I was on quiet residential streets with no traffic at midnight, I was 
safe).

I did get nervous when I heard some people somewhere near me; a cane make 
you an awfully big target. I'm a big guy, its not often I feel vulnerable.

Thanks,
Jim

"From compromise and things half done,
Keep me with stern and stubborn pride,
And when at last the fight is won,
... Keep me still unsatisfied." --Louis Untermeyer



_______________________________________________
nabs-l mailing list
nabs-l at nfbnet.org
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nabs-l_nfbnet.org
To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for 
nabs-l:
http://www.nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nabs-l_nfbnet.org/bookwormahb%40earthlink.net

__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature 
database 4150 (20090612) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

http://www.eset.com