If It Is to Be, It's Up to Me

Nobody ever told I couldn’t do something: riding a bicycle, roller-skating, or reading, just to name a few.  The one exception is driving.

I was born legally blind.  I don’t have pity parties.  I don’t wonder “why me?”  I take the hand I was dealt and make do the best way I know how.  It wasn’t always that way.

On a cloudy October afternoon, I pushed my bicycle up the driveway.  I cried even though I tried not to.  And I hoped Mom was home.

On this particular afternoon, the week after time change, after school, I decided to ride my bike around the neighborhood.  Our roads weren’t the best.  They had chug holes that had been patched and others that hadn’t yet been. 

I saw the chug holes by the way the shadows were in them.  With the time change, the shadows were different and I wasn’t used to it yet.  My front tire went into the hole and hit the opposite side.  I fell over and hit my left elbow on the asphalt.  I thought of how to explain how I fell over as I pushed my bike the block and a half I had ridden.

Thankfully, Mom was home.  She took one look at my elbow and we went to the emergency room.  I cracked my elbow and was in a splint from my fingertips to above my elbow.  After everything was taken care of, she asked how I did it.  When she found out how I rode a bike--never looking up from the front tire--she made me sell my bike.

I got to keep the money from it.  For an eighth grader, $50 was a lot of money!

Hey, I said I could ride a bike.  I never said I could do it very well.

There’s more to it than that. 

In elementary school, I was teased for wearing glasses.  Many times, I would not wear them.  Kids can be mean and I took it too much to heart.

In junior high, in an effort to help as much as they could, the school requested large print books for me.  Everyone else had one locker.  I had two. 

In high school, since the large print books didn’t work well (largely because I refused to use them), the school me got books on tape.  I listened to one tape exactly one time and put them back in the box.  I found it too difficult to try to study with books on tape.  It may work well for some low-vision students, but it didn’t work for me.

I saw my first CCTV when I was in college.  It was a closed circuit TV, common in security, adapted as a low-vision aid.  The monitor and the magnifier that would make it show on the screen intrigued me.  It could even do reverse polarity if you had trouble reading black print on the white background.  It enlarged text, handwriting, and even pictures.  Thankfully, no one ever offered one to me.  I like to hold the book in my hands when I read, which is probably another reason why I didn’t like books on tape.

I made do.  For the most part, I used regular-size print books as all the other students did.  I used magnifying glasses and page magnifiers.  The one exception was when I took typing in ninth grade.  We did enlarge the pages I had to type from then.  Otherwise, I couldn’t do it.

From about 11 to 17, I went to a camp for the blind and visually impaired every summer.  My eyes were opened there.  I saw other people with vision problems.  I met some who saw better than I did who did less.  I met others with no sight at all who did more than I would have thought to do.  In their own ways, they were all inspirations. 

I learned later that there were many things we did while I was growing up that were “accommodations.”  It was how it always was, so I never thought anything of it.  In many ways, we still do it today.

I live in a small town with little public transportation.  I rarely worry about how I am going to get to work, to the library, to the grocery store.  If it’s not too far, I walk, but I also have friends and family who will take me where I need to go.

I am responsible for myself and what I can or cannot do.  I may be “handicapped” or “disabled” according to medical and societal definitions, but I don’t like either of those words in relation to me.  They imply I cannot when I know I can.  As my Grandma often says, “If it is to be, it’s up to me.”