It was always heartening to see the blind live a normal life at my workplace. I could always see a blind man smoking his way to glory in the courtyard and a blind couple having lunch and giggling much the way normal folks do. I always found one guys finding his way through the maze that was my workplace. I was always curious of their precise sense of spatial orientation and thanked goodness for that.
Thats broken today. I was having a chat with my friends when I heard a loud "thud" behind the pillar. It was the the member of the couple who was carrying his lunch and had to hit the pillar and fall down on the sharp edges flower-pot area.His lower lip was bleeding immensely.We helped him get on his legs and asked if he was doing Okay.He said it was all right.My heart winced when I could then see that it was quite a deep cut and this guy was shrugging off our profferred help(cant discriminate if it was due to his nature of handling things or he was shy). His female companion was enquiring the same and I dont know if the fact the she cannot see her friend bleeding is a curse or a boon.He reassured her that everything was okay and it was a minor accident.
If it were the same for a normal person with sight he would have balked at the sight of the gore. If he were a kid a mother would immediately attend his wound and at the least there would be somebody to nurse his wound.This guy was strange in the way he didnt want to attract attention and wanted to move on to his destination(and presumably have his lunch in peace!)
To add to this confusion we were directing him in a way he didnt wanna go.He wanted to pass through our building rather than enter it.(Too bad that we didnt ask him where he wanted to go.) Finally he was on his away normally as ever, licking his wound and saying something cheerful to his partner. If I only could see what they were seeing ..
7 comments:
Hey,
Nice post!
Reminds me of this young blind couple whom I used to see everyday to the bus stop during college and never did I ever see them without a smile on their faces!
As you said..maybe they saw something..we couldnt!
Nice post, Paddy!
"If I only could see what they were seeing .." — Very wonderfully said!
Those eyes never saw
What mine did claw
But thy third eye could draw
Where mine had a flaw
For he was born blind
And I with eyes chained.
that's a touching incident paddy...
i know i would feel the same sort of embarrasment if i fell with my eyes open also...
but yes these people have a lot more self-respect and they hate to feel they cant manage by themselves.
I once had a deaf and dumb friend working with me at an office i worked earlier. He knew Autocad and had done some course in Designing. He couldnt do much so i used to help him make Models and teach him.
One fine day he didnt turn up at the office, we were all worried. I was. The next day when he did come we found out that he was locked in the house by his other dumb and deaf friend by mistake. He couldn't shout and his friend couldn't hear. He remained there all day!! He was laughing at the incident and soon bought himself a cellphone. Now he can SMS his friend and me too :)
Nice post - very insightful writing! Atta boy Paddy! :-)
I've always marvelled at the strenght required to overcome a handicap and live life, like we all supposedly "normal" people do. After 2 of the senior profs retired in my college, they hired a blind lady to teach the degree students - an incredibly intelligent and articulate lady. Sadly last I heard, the college was trying to bully her out of the job.
Recently, in my AF DL class, I had the fortune of meeting a blind student - he's studying Eco at Fergusson coll, Pune, as well as a course in Comp Sci from the Indire Gandhi Open Univ. Plus French at AF. Not to mention that he is a chess champion at college!
We who think we have it all, don't realise how little we use what God has gifted us...we should learn a lesson or two from people like these!
Have you read the short story called "The eyes have it" by Ruskin Bond? Its a heart warming story about a couple of blind people meeting in a train...
[HawkEye] I have read it but I can broadly recollect the main outline. It had a nice touching ending actually.Thanks for jogging my memory on that.
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