[PHOTO/CAPTION: Dave Hyde]

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Dave Hyde]

Braille Monitor

November

2004

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Half a Cup

by

Dave Hyde

Dave Hyge

From the Editor: Dave

Hyde currently serves as secretary of the Rock County chapter of the NFB of

Wisconsin, is the affiliate's director of governmental affairs, coordinates

the Imagination Fund for Wisconsin, and is the newly elected secretary of the

affiliate. At work he develops and schedules professional development activities

for vision teachers and O and M specialists all over the state. In his spare

time he coaches goal ball.

In the following little

article Dave grapples with a frustration faced by many competent blind people.

His conclusion sheds some light, even if it does not solve the problem. This

is what he says:

Until she died, my mother

never poured me more than half a cup of coffee. I'm sure this was something

she learned from some book or class about how blind people did things. Somehow,

some way, she learned that handling more than half a cup of hot liquid would

be hazardous and must be avoided.

She

and I discussed her half-cup habit over the years and agreed that I should have

a full cup like everyone else and that I didn't spill a full cup any more frequently

than she did. But every time she poured it, the cup was half full. As I grew

up, I realized that there was a difference between what she knew from experience

about blindness and what she had learned from sighted professionals about it.

She had taken some parent training when I was very young, part of which involved

eating under blindfold. She told me that it was very hard, that she was afraid

of spilling, and that after the experience she understood how hard it was for

blind people to eat.

Strangely

enough, I have never had any problem transporting food from the plate to my

mouth, drinking from a full cup, or locating things on a table. I have done

it every day because I have only two choices: eat or starve. I have always preferred

the former. Looking back, I can now see the difference between what my mother

was taught and what she learned. Mom was taught that she couldn't do things

as well under a blindfold as she could when she could see, but the lesson she

drew from this fact was that my experience would always be just like her lesson

under the blindfold.

The

first of these statements is true. It is hard for a sighted person to do things

under a blindfold. The blindfold simulates total blindness and requires the

participant to do things in a way which is new, uncomfortable, and fearful.

I have often likened learning of the skills of blindness to learning to drive

a car. You can't or shouldn't assume that, just because a person owns a car,

he or she can drive it. Driving requires instruction and practice. Eventually,

however, driving becomes easier and ultimately a matter of habit. The difficulty

with my mother's simulated blindness was that she didn't stick with it long

enough to develop skill. Incorrect though it was, she learned her lesson well.

Even after being around successful blind people at conventions; seeing me married,

employed, and successful; and knowing that many of the things she couldn't do

under blindfold my friends and I do all the time, she still remembered how hard

it had been for her and behaved accordingly.

The best solution I found

for dealing with the coffee was to thank her for the half cup and then go back

and fill the cup the rest of the way myself. Both of us recognized that the

cup was only half full, and she wasn't offended having me add more coffee. Even

with the best of intentions, some things cannot be unlearned. But my wife--she

who has a solution for everything--has solved the coffee problem in an entirely

different way. If I want it, I get it myself.

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