[stylist] Anita's reply/Lori's take

[loristay at aol.com]

Anita, in some ways you were quite lucky.  David, my husband, who is 70 years old, attended a school for the blind in the Bronx.  His cane training consisted of being hand a (short) cane and told to travel home for the holiday in a snow storm.  Which, by the way, he did.  His class was not given canes until they reached senior year.  He had to insist they be taught how to cut their meat.  At one point, the school was divided into girls dorms and boys dorms.  If there was a fire drill, they were told to return to their own dorm before exiting the building.  David asked what would happen if the fire was in the middle.  I'm told they changed the policy, but a few years later changed it back.  Talk about recipe for disaster!


I'm glad these dark ages have brightened a bit.
Lori




-----Original Message-----
From: Anita Adkins <aadkins7 at verizon.net>
To: Writer's Division Mailing List <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Sat, Dec 25, 2010 5:02 pm
Subject: Re: [stylist] stylist Digest, Vol 80, Issue 22 Anita's reply


Thanks for the review.  Just for everybody's curiosity sake, I did change the essay so that it does not sound the same concerning the blindness training vs. academic experience confusion, or so I hope.  I may repost just for a final review after it has been a couple of weeks so that anyone can make a final comment.  I am thankful to Donna for her comments.  Writing really is teamwork, even if there is only one author to one particular piece.  Without critique, a piece could not shape itself into what it needs to become, and I feel my essay is much improved with only the few comments I have received on it.  Also, hearing Kerry agree makes me feel better I had changed it because it means even more  when more than one person has commented about a particular concern. 
 
Kerry, I chose to reply to this msg because your subject line would normally have meant I would have deleted the msg without reading, and so I want to apologize if anyone has ever commented to me and I appeared to ignore them. I just read today because it was Christmas, I was bored, and the urge struck me to open this particular msg, and now I'm glad I did since it was a message for me.  In the future, you may want to switch your msg line so it reflects the contents of the email; please do not be offended because I am just making a suggestion so that more people may read your messages. 
 
Now, that I am not talking about my essay, I shall bring up a concern I maybe plan to research and write about in the future since this is a writing list, after all.  I did attend a school for the blind.  I had minimal cane training.  Kids with some vision were provided more O&M than anyone with practically no vision because it may have been believed these students could travel downtown and for other reasons I may not be aware of.  I received excellent Braille instruction, but again, I had no usable vision for reading large print.  Several students did read print, and thus, they did not learn Braille or, if they did, as a result, many of them suffer problems related to reading fluency.  I learned how to make a bed, how to vacuum, how to do some minor cooking and other kitchen skills in Home Economics/Daily Living Skills, and probably some other skills that do not come to mind at the moment.  there are many blindness skills I did not learn, however, and thus, I am lacking in these skills.  Part of this might be that I did not come from a family who knew what I needed and who advocated for what I needed, and so part of the blame lies with me and my family.  Part of this is because I was academically smart, and thus, it may have been easy for those responsible to think I knew the other stuff already.  I don't know.  I do know that part of the reason is because some of these skills were not the focus for me or others unless they related to something I needed in order to achieve academically.  For example, I needed to get to and from school every day, and so I was taught to shoreline, meaning I had one foot on the sidewalk and one foot on the grass.  I won't continue down this path, but I find it an interesting topic to take a look at for a research paper in order to improve the lives of future blind students. I also want to make sure to say that I feel the lack of blindness skills taught to me was not alienated to my particular school. 
So, for now, thank you for the ear to speak what I am thinking as doing so will help me to write it down in a more formal way later, and pondering it will also enable me to think up a plan for conducting research on the topic. 
 
Merry Christmas to all.  Anita 
----- Original Message ----- From: "Kerry Thompson" <kethompson1964 at gmail.com> 
To: <stylist at nfbnet.org> 
Sent: Saturday, December 25, 2010 3:58 PM 
Subject: Re: [stylist] stylist Digest, Vol 80, Issue 22 
 
> Anita, I don't have anything substantive to say about your essay, which I > thought was very good. Good luck getting the scholarship and with your > college career in general. 
> 
> Donna, "non-traditional" is the term that seems to have become accepted > for an adult (someone older than eighteen to twenty-two) who returns to > college. Anita's target audience will recognize the term. I also was > puzzled by the disjunct between academics and blindness training, > especially at a school for the blind. But, she only has seven hundred > words. The point I took was that she didn't get all the blindness training > she really needed, but she has become a successful person anyway. 
> 
> Jim, yeah, I'll probably have a good time, even just listening. 
> 
> Merry Christmas and happy, safe and peaceful holidays, everybody. 
> 
> Solidarity and Peace, 
> 
> Kerry 
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