Adventures with Racer

Visited the City Creek Mall on Friday night with my niece and boyfriend. Waiting for the elevator, the doors open and a girl about five years old exclaims, “Oh, how cute, please come in this elevator, please, please!” The elevator is going down and we need to go up, so we say Sorry as the doors close. We continue to wait and then the elevator appears again, this time going up. The door opens and it is the same family with the pleading little girl, only this time she is cheering, YAY! We step in laughing as the cute girl makes room for Racer to sit right beside her. I love encountering polite children and she just calmly stands near my dog saying sweet little things like, what a good boy, what a sweet dog!

There is a creek running down the center of this mall, and we decide to stop and see if Racer notices the large koi fish that are swimming in the creek. My boyfriend tells me that Racer starts to curiously watch the fish; his ears perk up and the tail starts wagging.  Passersby stop to watch my dog watch the fish.

This morning we went to the park for a walk. Racer decides he needs to relieve and my boyfriend says he will do the honors. He takes the leash and steps onto the grass while I hold the harness and stay on the sidewalk. After a few minutes, I hear my boyfriend’s footsteps and my dog sidles up to me and leans into the back of my legs. I say hello, and am about to reach down to buckle the harness on when I hear a guy say, “C’mon, lets go buddy.” I suddenly realize it isn’t my boyfriend or my dog! The owner gently pulls on his leash and they walk away. Then my boyfriend walks up. Having seen the whole thing, he says, “It was a black lab.” At least I had the breed right!” Smiles ensue.  

It Makes Sense

I am in awe of my experience with blindness. I’m not saying I wouldn’t jump at the chance to get my vision back, but honestly it is interesting to me to think about the way I experienced the world when I had sight verses now when I am blind. Just thinking about the human body and how it compensates, I remember going to a lecture where the speaker said that the visual cortex is a very large part of the brain. But when a person goes blind the brain switches gears and sends more signals to the other parts of the brain which control the other senses, so they get more nutrients and blood flow and they grow larger and larger while the visual cortex actually shrinks.

It’s springtime now, and today I was on my early morning walk around the Avenues. My guide dog leads me and takes the stress out of navigating through the neighborhood so I am able to daydream and notice what my other senses are picking up. We set out at 6:30 am, and at that time there are so many birds singing. It is so loud and beautiful that it makes me imagine that I am in a rain forest. I even hear a wood pecker nearby. I start to smell fragrant flowers that are so sweet and the scent is so potent I think I must be walking through a flower shop. I want to bottle it and use it for perfume. This particular morning a very unexpected scent hits my nose, and I could tell my dog was keen to it too. The most sensational aroma of fried chicken permeated this section of the block. How strange! At this hour of the morning? Really! I don’t know who was drooling more, me or my dog!

I used to go on many walks when I was sighted, but I don’t remember experiencing any of the things that caught my interest this morning on our fabulous walk through the Avenues!

Street Corner Religion

This originally appeared on the Vision Through Words blog on Feb 10, 2016.

https://visionthroughwords.wordpress.com/2016/02/10/street-corner-religion/

 

 I was walking from the bus to my office one cold morning. I was standing at the corner of an intersection waiting for the light to change and cupping my one free hand over my nose and mouth to stay warm. A man walked up and said, “Hi doggie, what’s your name?” I said, “Please don’t talk to him because he is working.” The man then starts talking to me and says he used to be on oxygen, but then God healed him. “Oh that’s nice,” I said. My ears perk up and I realize that the light has changed, and we are so close to getting to my warm office. I give Racer the hand gesture for forward, and don’t have to say anything; he just starts leading me across. The man stays put, but I hear him calling after us, “I prayed, and prayed, and prayed.” His words just hung in the chilly air echoing on and on. It’s weird but I felt like my dog was in agreement with me that this guy was a quack. Maybe what he had to share with me was meaningful but his delivery was lacking. I couldn’t help but wonder why he had decided to share that bit of information with me. Was he indicating that his illness was similar to my blindness and he wanted to offer praying as a solution? Would he have shared this information with just anyone at the corner? I can’t help but feel that it had something to do with my disability. Multiple times I’ve been approached by other strangers who try to tell me that there are doctors who can fix my blindness. They are certain that they have read somewhere about a procedure that will help me. I assure them that I visit a specialist every year who would inform me of any cutting edge remedies. I’ve come to terms with my blindness, but apparently people I sometimes encounter have not. If I were to tell that man my true feelings about praying to be healed, I would say that it would feel too arrogant to ask God to heal me. I would rather God spend his energy on more pressing issues, like granting food to the starving children around the world. Blindness, I can deal with. Going without food, now that’s a problem.

Old Yeller

We stepped onto the elevator at the ski lodge and a young boy exclaimed, “Your dog looks just like Old Yeller!” My boyfriend says, “How do you know about Old Yeller?” The boy explains that he read it in school and saw the movie. We arrived at the 6^th floor and the doors opened. I decided I better download Old Yeller so that I could participate in future literary discussions with ten year olds. The next day is Sunday and boyfriend stops by my place and notices I’ve been crying and asks me about it. “Old Yeller,” I said. He can’t believe I’ve finished it in one afternoon. I remind him it’s only a three hour audio book. Aren’t Mormon Church services that long? Hey, and it is a Sunday after all.

 

“A children's story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children's story in the slightest.”
― C.S. Lewis

 

Merry Christmas, Baby

I have mixed emotions today. I am excited for the holidays to begin and today is Winter Solstice. Tonight we will visit a really old and beautiful church to hear a Jazz Winter Solstice concert. A woman just introduced me to Merry Christmas, Baby by Charles Brown. On the other hand I got word that my dear cousin Lisa is dying of brain cancer. I just hugged her a few weeks ago at her mother’s funeral. She had been taking care of her mother for quite a while and was very drained by it. Then a few days after the funeral, she started acting confused and in a matter of weeks she is diagnosed and told that it has spread to the lymph nodes. Last night I was trying to digest all of this information. I was told she was in the hospital and so I planned to order some flowers to be delivered this morning but before I could make the call to the flower shop my mom texted me and said she is going home and she only has 2 weeks to live. Lisa has such a kind heart and always thinks of others. Whenever I would post pics of my dog on facebook she was always commenting and saying such sweet things to me. There is kind of a big age difference between us so we haven’t spent a lot of time together but through all of my encounters with her it has always been clear to me that she has a caring heart and has a lot of compassion. I don’t think I’m going to be able to say goodbye to her and tell her how much I love her. The brain cancer has made her very confused and she isn’t recognizing any of her loved ones now.

Happy Friday

It seems like I have been writing about mishaps on the bus lately so I wanted to write about our bus ride today because it is an example of a great bus day. I take two different buses in the morning to get to work. I had both of my favorite bus drivers today and both buses were on time. Hardly anyone was on the bus and nobody talked to me. I leaned back against the seat and Racer gently rested his head on my foot. It was tranquil and warm. I love mornings like this on public transit. It is Friday and I’m always in a good mood on Friday. A co-worker and I went to lunch and she pointed out that a man was walking across the street holding a phone up to his ear along with a cigar and a beer—all in one hand!

 

“It's 4:58 on Friday afternoon. Do you know where your margarita is?” ~ Amy Neftzger

   

Yeah Whatever

I’m still so in love with my Racer boy. He brings me so much joy. He is my mini oxytocin factory. Sometimes our adventures on the bus are daunting but I tell myself that it is better to deal with all the action that comes with using public transit than to sit home and shrivel up on the couch. Sure it is 20 degrees outside but we get to run down the street together, yes my guide dog decided it is more fun to run ever since winter showed up.  I feel invigorated and there is that rush of relief and excitement when we arrive at work and we both know that once again we did it as a team. Whew!

This morning we boarded the bus and it was mostly empty. The bus driver that I really like greeted us and said the seat at the front was available. I got Racer tucked in under me and a few stops later a woman got on and instead of walking further to the back of the bus she sat right by me. She started talking to my dog and asked if she could pet him. I said he was working and started to explain that if I let everyone pet him he will start to seek out attention from others and that would affect his concentration with guiding me. The bus driver then chimed in and said to the woman that she should leave the seats at the front of the bus for persons with disabilities. She complied and moved away. I was so thankful to the bus driver for having my back. He has witnessed over the past few months over and over again people trying to interact with my dog. It really gets old explaining the rules every morning to a new person. I’m not a social person and especially in the morning, I’m just not in the mood. People are just curious and excited to see a nice looking dog and I know they mean well. I don’t mind  if someone makes a comment to me about my dog or asks me questions but my dog isn’t just a play thing that I take around to show off. I’m totally blind and trying to navigate through the city and I usually have butterflies in my stomach until I get to work safely.

Yesterday we had a different bus driver so I told him which stop I needed and took a seat. The bus was pretty crowded and a group of guys got on and sat across from me. One of the men started petting Racer without asking and I could tell because he was petting so vigorously that Racer’s head was bouncing all over. I told the man to please not pet him and he actually continued doing it so I reached down and placed my hand on top of his hand and said a second time to please not pet him; he is working. The man’s response was, “Yeah, whatever.”

 

“I walked to work. I paced up and down the bus looking for a seat. Next time I walk to work I’m getting on my treadmill.”
― Jarod Kintz