Cane Training For The Blind

CANE TRAINING

Overwork School for the Blind

Philadelphia, PA

1965

Red robins, daffodils, crocus: the first signs of spring for most people.  But for those of us who grew up near the Overbrook School for the Blind, there was another sign of spring: the first day of cane training.  In the early spring, each year, on the first nice day, we would hear the tapping of the cane on the sidewalks, followed by the crisp, authoritative commands of “right, no that’s your left.  Go right. Slower, not so fast. Pick yourself up.”

And then I would spot them: a young boy, maybe six, and an adult trainer trailing close behind him. The man would have one hand on the boy’s right shoulder, guiding him gently from the back.

Our neighborhood was old. So many of the trees had grown so much that their root system emerged under the sidewalk, causing most of these slabs of concrete to protrude inconsistently. This caused a challenge to all new students.  How do you blindly maneuver through a course that has so many obstacles?

The boy would fall down as my family and I watched him from our front porch.  It would be painful for all of us.  This boy would cry and want to give up. The instructor would help him up and set him back on course.  And we would grimace in sorrow and pity as the kid tried again and then fell again.

“No” said the instructor, “you have to pay attention. Make short gestures.  Keep your cane closer to your feet and then you’ll feel the bumps”.

It was hard to watch in the early spring. But as the season progressed, so did the student’s skills.  And eventually, he would figure out his stride and he would begin to master the cane.  And as he improved, we would sometimes call out words of encouragement. Or we would clap for him. And he would raise his cane in appreciation, not always sure exactly where we were. His head swiveled as he tried to locate our sounds.

By the end of the summer, he would finally be on his own.  The guide would walk ten feet behind him as he confidently walked the distance by himself. And when he reached this level of skill, we knew we would never see him again.  His training was complete.

And as this season ended, we knew it wouldn’t be long before we heard the first sounds of next spring and a new child, learning to be independent.

Montezuma

In the Halls of Montezuma
Our Home in Philadelphia, PA

Philadelphia, PA

1965

I decided to ask my siblings to write their stories of our childhood.  Our mother had just died.  Her parents were immigrants and we had very little information about their childhood.  My father’s family was dying off.  And so was all of our oral history.

“If we all write just 10 stories each, we could have 70 of them”, I tell them, hoping to ignite some excitement around my very clever idea.  They show absolutely no interest in my request.  They weren’t just indifferent to the project.  They thought it as stupid.

“You don’t even have to type the stories, I will do that for you and I’ll do all of the formatting. I will put a book together for all of us to have,” I pleaded with them.  They continue to be unmoved by my request.

“It must be nice to have no kids.  When you don’t have kids, you have time to waste on stuff like this, said one sister.

I never got any takers to write even one lousy story.  But occasionally, one of them would call me and say,  "hey are you still writing that stupid family book?  I have a story you could write, remember when…” and then the story would be retold to me no matter how much I pleaded with them to write it down.

They didn’t. Not one of them.  But consistently a few of them remembered one particular story.

It was 1965; our uncle, an officer in the Marine Corp, was serving a tour of duty in Viet Nam. We worried about him every day.  We prayed for him.  And every Friday, we added his name to the long list of servicemen who got letters from the students in our grade school.

At the same time, someone gave my father a cheap, play-by-numbers, electronic, squeaky keyboard.

We put it in the hallway and we all attempted to learn how to play it. I still remember Mary Had A Little Lamb: 321 2333 222 333 321 2333 322321. Sometimes I would get the threes and the twos mixed up.  That really messed up the flow of the song.

We learned Happy Birthday and Twinkle, Twinkle and Oh Susanna.  We all seemed to have a particular favorite.  However, we all felt a great need to learn the marine’s anthem, In The Halls of Montezuma.  We played that song too frequently and too poorly. It was dreadful but we played it with a thought that this act alone would bring our uncle home safely.

As my siblings reflected on this story, they all remembered how dreadful the others played. Individually, they all bragged they were the best.  But that is a ridiculous thought because, really, truly, I was the best.

A Bit of Beauty From My Garden

My back yard: I spend hours in my garden during the summer and I spend hours during the winter, missing my garden.

New Year's Eve- Times Square

New Year’s Eve- Time Square- 1978

My first year out of college was fun and freeing but it was also confining.  I loved being an adult now.  And having an income, as meager as it was, was so liberating.  But being responsible and confided to a 40 hour a week obligation did require an adjustment to my free spirit.  It limited my spontaneity.  It required me to get to bed at a reasonable hour each work night.  I had to iron my blouses now.  And panty hose ate up too much of my expendable income.

So my free time was cherished and I tried to make every minute count.  So when I got an invitation to spend New Year’s Eve in Time Square, I jumped with excitement.  Yes, I wanted to bring in the New Year at the most happening spot in the world.  Yes, this was one cool idea, an adventure worth bragging about.  “Yea, I was in Time Square on New Year’s” I would tell people nonchalantly as if to convey, where else would you expect me to celebrate the New Year.

So I packed a backpack and hopped a train to Penn Station.  I made my way to my friends’ apartment.  It was a one bedroom apartment and three of them shared the place.  The twin sisters shared the bottom bunk and Judy had the top bunk.  There was a fold out table in the kitchen.  And when the table was out, it blocked the door to the bathroom.  So if someone had to use the bathroom when we were eating, we would all have to get up, grab our plate and grab one of the bowls of food as well.  And someone dropped a leaf of the table.  And we all rearranged ourselves to let the other person out and then we waited until she finished in the bathroom.  And then she came out and we rearranged ourselves again.  And none of us cared about this inconvenience because that is the price you pay to live and play in this great city.

So now it was time to make our way down to Time Square.  Someone asked “how much money are you bringing.  How much money should I bring?  Should I bring it all?”

I offered a bit of caution.  “Only bring as much as you can afford to lose.  I’m not bringing my train money with me.  There are going to be lots of pick pocketers in the crowd.”  Well, you would have thought that a great prophet had just spokes because my line was quoted several times in the next hour as we all got ready for the big event.

It was cold and we bundled up and then drank too much blackberry brandy.  We had convinced ourselves that this drink would keep us warm, which it didn’t.  It only served to get us drunk quickly and then we had to go to the bathroom which was not available to us.  But this major inconvenience did not curb any of our drinking.

Crowds had already gathered.  The streets were crowded. Stores were crowded.  And excitement filled the air.  And my group of friends strutted through life with a sense of coolness that we thought we had earned.  Watch out Manhattan, we had arrived.

We made our way to Time Square and we were sandwiched in amongst thousands of people, most of them very, very drunk.  People were smoking pot.  Hustlers were luring drunks in to their card tricks and taking their money.  Merchants were selling knock off bags and scarves and hats.

We found a group of guys who shared their whiskey with us.  And after a few shots, some of us were trading shots for kisses.  And this arrangement seemed to be agreeable with all of us. We were having a good time.

The ball was going to drop in fifteen minutes and that is when a fight broke out.  I looked to my left and four or five teenage boys were rolling on the ground, wrestling each other.  The crowd forced an open gap to get out of the boys’ way.  The boys shot up and startled to run.  And then I felt someone push me and I heard the woman beside me scream, “Get him. He took my necklace.”  The woman was hysterical.  The boys had eyed her beautiful, expensive multi-diamond necklace just a few minutes ago and then they faked a fight as a way to distract all of us to pull off this perfectly executed robbery.  And I had just noticed her necklace, just moments before it was stolen. It sparkled so much under the street lights that it caught my attention. And now it was gone.

Now this woman wanted me to run after them and get her necklace back.  She was shaking and bordering on shock.  I told the woman that I would go find a police officer.  But I was not going to risk my life over this woman’s diamond necklace.  That’s why you have homeowner’s insurance.

When I didn’t move right away, she turned to the others in the crowd and demanded, “Go get them.”  But like me, no one complied.  But a police officer did arrive on the scene and he moved the lady out of the crowd.  But her anger and her disappointment in us lingered in the air.

I don’t remember watching the ball drop.  I was still absorbed by the robbery.  I couldn’t believe the thoughtlessness and selfishness of the robbers.  And I couldn’t believe the arrogance of the victim.  She was in this large, unruly crowd in her beautiful full length mink coat.  Her neckline was purposely exposed on this cold night and she proudly displayed her diamond necklace with 20 or 30 diamonds worth thousands of dollars. And then, in the blink of an eye, it was gone.  And then she expected complete strangers to risk their lives to get her necklace back. And when we didn’t, she became angry with us.  And as I stewed over these last few minutes, I found myself becoming more and more angry with her.  She chose to call attention to herself.  She chose to display this beautiful necklace to this large crowd of the rich and the poor, the haves and the have- nots.  And the have- nots saw it and went for it.  She didn’t deserve it.  But she was careless and ostentatious and now she is the victim. But really, we were all victims because a cloud of anger and regret hung over all of us as others cheered for the end of one year and the hopes of a new year.

Put The Kettle ON

“PUT THE KETTLE ON”
My Mother's House
Philadelphia, PA
1962-1998

“I’ll miss the tea the most”, said Deb, my college friend.  We were at my mother’s grave site when Deb made this statement.  “I’ll miss the hours around the kitchen table, just talking and drinking tea.”

And I thought to myself, “So will I.”   While I had never taken these moments for granted, I never really thought about how lucky I was to have the pleasure of just sitting and talking with the good company of my good family.

At any time during the course of the day, my mother would call for the gathering of those who were interested to have a cup of tea with her.  But consistently, we had tea after dinner.  We ate dinner together every night and then we would clear the table and my mother would give the direction to “put the kettle on.”  It was large, maybe it held a gallon of water and the latch was taped with duct tape to make it easier to handle when it was hot.

There were usually lots of us at the table.  In addition to my parents and six siblings, my grandparents shared many, many dinners with us.  And from time to time, one of us would have invited a friend to dinner.  And frequently, the doorbell would ring and a neighborhood or two would meander in to the kitchen, my mother would gesture to those of us on the bench against the wall.  ‘Schooch down” she would say.  And we would scrunch together and make room for our neighbors who joined us at the table.

The water would boil, the kettle would whistle, tea mugs were scattered amongst us, a box of tea bags, spoons, sugar and milk appeared in the middle of the table. And then, one of us would start pouring cup after cup until everyone was served.

And then the stories of the day would begin. Being Irish, we had an unwritten rule, an understanding, that our stories didn’t have to be filled with facts.  There was really no concern for this.  They just had to be entertaining.  The stories had to be filled with great, vivid, humorous details. the truth was secondary, almost of little importance.

Sometimes we spoke individually and demanded everyone’s attention. Other times, multiple stories would be going on as small pockets of audiences had huddled together.

My father attempted to set the tone. “What have you done today to better the world”?  He asked this question every night.  And every night we laughed at him and dismissed him.  Instead we highlighted our days, our thoughts, and our focus.

Kathy spoke with annoyance about those of us who got in trouble at school.  This usually resulted in a reprimand to me from my mother.  Jimmy made fun of his teachers.  And my mother always took exception to this disregard for authority. Sharon told outrageous stories of classmates and their follies.  Christopher was quiet but spoke with pleasure of classmates who pulled one over on their teachers.  This too, resulted in a comment from my mother. Patricia spoke of her friendship.  I kept quiet because too much had already been disclosed about me.  Brian, much younger than the rest of us, struggled to find his voice amongst his loud siblings.

My grandparents spoke of their travels around the world and their lifelong friends.  My father, a lawyer, at the time, handled all of our disagreements as if he were a judge in a courthouse.  We would have to defend our position and present logic to our thinking. And no matter how rational we thought our argument was, we were always told that our adolescent thinking wouldn’t hold up in a court of law. My mother talked about art and her radio talk shows and injustices from her point of view.  She would critique the meal and then talk about tomorrow’s meal. And she would often use this time to present her list of what needed to be done around the house. Our neighbors told us of the happenings in their families. And our dinner guests usually said nothing; they just sat and tried to take it all in: this loud exchange of stories and random thoughts and sarcasm and laughter.

Sometimes, we would sit for an hour or more.  And then slowly, we wandered off, one by one, as obligations of homework called to us.  The last two or three who remained, stayed behind and cleaned up, leaving no trace of the conversations that had just occurred.

2/14/2011

Taking The Blind Kids to Church

Taking the Blind Kids to Church

Overwork School for the Blind

Our Lady of Lourdes Church

Philadelphia, PA

1966

I went to Catholic school.  So it was mandated that all of the school children go to mass together each Sunday.  We met in the chapel and each grade sat in its assigned area and roll was taken.  And if you were not at mass, it was expected that you arrive at school on Monday with a note from your mother with an acceptable explanation.

Our lay teachers weren’t there.  But all of the nuns were and they kept order with a firm hand and killer glaring looks.  No one was allowed to deviate from the expectation of sitting up straight, praying and kneeling.  No one, except the blind kids from the Overbrook School for the Blind.  They were pitied by the nuns.  So they were allowed to rock and occasionally, but not too frequently, grunt a noise. But when they strayed too far, a nun would comment, “Alright, that’s enough of that.  You can behave just like the rest of the children.  You’re blind remember, not retarded.” 

This did not usually stop the behavior because the blind kid was usually unaware that he was the target of the nun’s reprimand. Realizing this, she would have to go over and poke the kid to get his attention.  This would startle him for two reasons: (1) he had not seen her coming so he hadn’t anticipated her poke and (2) he wasn’t accustomed to being addressed in such a harsh manner.  So with no adult from the blind school to fend for him, he would coil up and try to make himself invisible from this unknown authority figure.

There was no adult from the blind school because we brought the kids to church on Sunday.   We, the sixth grades, were given that responsibility.  We were hand-picked by the nuns and it was our responsibility to be at the blind school every Sunday at 8:30 AM to walk the blind kids to church.

I remember being picked.  I was absolutely thrilled.  I was honored.  And I approached this responsibility with all the commitment as if I was protecting the President of the United States.  I made up my mind that no blind kid was going to fall or stumble under my care.

My first day of my new assignment was raining. It was cold and dark. It was midwinter.  But that didn’t matter to me.  I had important work to do that day.  I got up, put on my school uniform and walked proudly to the blind school.  I was on time, in uniform and ready to complete my assignments. I felt as if I should have saluted someone upon my arrival.

We met in the lobby which was completely dark. No one had turned on the lights.  We could barely see.  But then we could hear the kids coming down the hallway, their voices echoing and bouncing off the cement walls.  And I was filled with so much anticipation.

I was matched with Susie Hart.  She was a year older than me and a foot taller. She was very pretty and she held herself a little differently from the others.  She didn’t rock.  And she wore make-up. I liked her right away.

When it was time to leave, I commented to Suzie that is was hard to see because the lights weren’t on.  I was nervous about taking her down the steps in the dark.

“I don’t know why they don’t turn the light on.” I whined.

“Because we don’t need them,” she nonchalantly replied.

"Why?”

'We’re all blind.  We don’t need lights.”

Good point, I thought to myself. This thought had never entered the realm of my self-centeredness.

With that, she put my hand on her shoulder and confidently said, “Follow me; I’ll lead you out of here.” And out we went.

Tony: Even Tough Kids Get Bullied

Tony is 14, slightly built and caramel color.  His family is from Puerto Rico.  He stands out amongst his classmates who are predominately white, middle class and unworldly.  In this rural community, diversity is not embraced.  It is barely tolerated.

We are at the football dinner, celebrating the end of a successful season.  The seniors are roasting the underclassmen. One senior gets up and announces, “I know it is a little early but I wanted to be the first one to say to Tony, ‘Happy Father’s Day’.”  The crowd roars, to my horror.  How could anyone find it funny that a 14 year old boy is a father?  How sad to be in the midst of adolescence, trying to figure it out and just when life is complicated enough, you are now a father, at 14.

A few months later, I am in my office, long after school is finished for the day.  All the students are home and I am enjoying the quiet, going through piles of files on my desk.

Tony charges in through the open door, coming to a screeching halt.  He is out of breath, bent over and panting.

“Sorry. Sorry”, he says with some difficulty.

“You OK?”, I ask.

“Yea, yea”.  He straightens up now. I give him a glass of water.

“I just didn’t know where to go, so I ran here. I knew you’d be here”, he tells me.

“What’s the matter?”

“It’s that Jason.  He’s after me again”.

No clarification is needed.  Jason is a bully. Not much bigger that Tony, he is a kid with a quick temper and an intolerance for most people who offer him the slightest opposition of any sort.

“He called me a spic and punched me.  Said I was a dirty PR”.

"Where is he now", I demand.

“No, no, it’s OK.  Let it alone.  I can handle him if I have to.  I just ran away.  I had to”.

The look on my face must have shown my surprise.  I didn’t think Tony would ever walk away from a fight.

“I’m not afraid of him”, Tony continues, “I know I could beat him up if I had to.  But my mom told me if I get in one more fight, I am going to be grounded for two weeks and I have to babysit my daughter on Saturday.  So I can’t mess with him right now.  Know what I mean? I’m not afraid of him”.  But he says this in a tone of some shame.

He caught his breathe and checks to see if Jason is anywhere around.  Deciding that it was safe to venture out again, he leaves just as quickly as he entered.

I go back to my desk and sit down.  I reply the conversation in my head, the absurdity of it all bounces around like clashing cymbals.