[Nfbv-announce] Walk with the Blind in historic Fredericksburg Saturday!

[Michael Kasey]

As you have already been reminded several times, our Walk With the Blind is
this Saturday, April 16, two days from today.  We will gather by 9:30 at the
Fredericksburg City Dock.  After opening ceremonies and distribution of gift
certificates, the walk will begin at approximately 10:30.  Without
interruptions, your walk from the dock to the library should take
approximately 30 minutes.  Please walk directly to the library since the
access service staff will be awaiting for us.  Then, as you walk back to the
dock, if you win a gift certificate, we hope you visit the shop which
donated it.  Currently, we know we will have at least 30 gift certificates.


 

Please remember, this walk is our one and only annual fund raising activity.
Without money in our treasury, we cannot provide assistance to those who, in
some cases, urgently require it.  We cannot help people develop their
leadership potential by inviting them to our invaluable training sessions
and seminars.  We cannot assist people who recently became blind by sending
them to a convention to meet with and learn from those of us with more
experience.  This is the most important occasion annually when we urge you,
in the strongest possible terms, to do everything you can to obtain
financial support for NFB from your family, friends, and personal as well as
professional acquaintances.  We suggest doing this by letting them know how
important the organization is to you.

 

Here is what I would say if asked why NFB is important to me.  I attended my
first convention in 1972.  I was so fascinated to meet people who were blind
and engaged in challenging pursuits such as teaching physics in New York
City's roughest public schools.  As a college student majoring in French, I
was also excited to meet a man who spoke seven languages fluently.
Everything intrigued me;   I was 19 years old.

 

One of our most perceptive members realized all this unbridled curiosity
might get me into situations beyond my limited experience to handle.  He
invited me to attend the resolutions committee meeting with him.

 

Another  member explained what was occurring.  People who were blind could
not take the federal civil service examinations which were a prerequisite
qualification for government positions.  I sat at the table while the
committee wrote the resolution which addressed this issue.  Eight years
later, because of that resolution and subsequent NFB actions, I competed on
terms of equality by taking the Professional Administrative and Career
Examination, the test required to qualify for mid-level federal positions.
This marked the beginning of a monumental change in my life.  NFB helped me
move from Illinois to Washington, D.C., interview for Federal government
positions and secure one!  I could not have made the trip, moved a quarter
of the way across the  country or maintained myself during more than three
months of unemployment without financial support from NFB.  Six years later,
NFB once again helped me compete on terms of equality by purchasing my first
computer,  the software  considered standard at that time to operate it and
the training to use this gift productively.  

 

Holly Frisch

President

Fredericksburg Area chapter NFB of Virginia

 

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The National Federation of the Blind knows that blindness is not the
characteristic that defines you or your future. Every day we raise the
expectations of blind people, because low expectations create obstacles
between blind people and our dreams. You can live the life you want;
blindness is not what holds you back.