Talk Radio

BAM! I enjoyed talking to local radio host Clint Strand about Blindness Awareness Month on KOHO Radio today. I was quite nervous about sharing my story with my local community.

After it aired, I received the best text from my friend Rebecca. “You sound great and assertive and approachable and kinda sexy.” The sexy part was likely due to a scratchy throat, but it made me laugh and I appreciated the encouragement!

If you missed the interview on the radio today, here it is! LISTEN TO JENELLE’S INTERVIEW

Word Choice

BAM! Not only is October Blindness Awareness Month, but it is also Disability Awareness Month.  Below is a post written by Susan, author of Adventures in Low Vision, who kindly agreed to let us share this brilliant post on our blog this month.  

I was playing with my cat as a kid still in single digits on the kitchen floor. Twenty minutes passed. He decided he wanted to play elsewhere. The orange tabby was not quite fast enough. I scooped him up, looked at his face and called him a silly bastard.

Mom heard me. She was quick to admonish me by asking, “Do you know what that means?” I bet my ears turned red. My embarrassment grew when, as parents do, she gave the word’s definition. I stopped calling the cat a bastard.

Words have meaning. Handicapped. Crippled. The R word. Blind. Visually impaired. A person with a disability. Where do words and phrases like these come from?  Check out the etymology of handicapped and see if you still want to refer to people with disabilities as handicapped. Continue reading “Word Choice” →

How I Told My Workplace About My Low Vision (A Guest Post by Jen Walker)

If you read Jen’s guest post yesterday, “Should I Tell My Workplace I’m Losing My Eyesight?,”  then you are probably curious HOW she did it.  Here’s her story!  

Here is a play by play of how my ‘coming out’ went. At my current school, with my current boss, I started missing handshakes, people handing me things, I couldn’t keep up with looking at kid’s data in small print….and I couldn’t come up with any more excuses as to why my dad was driving me to work at age 30! Continue reading “How I Told My Workplace About My Low Vision (A Guest Post by Jen Walker)” →

Should I Tell My Workplace I’m Losing My Eyesight? (A Guest Post by Jen Walker)

I’m so excited to introduce you to our friend, Jen.  She has been reading our blog for awhile now, and we’ve been chatting about our lives as young moms with RP for a couple years.  We are also part of the same online community of visually impaired women on Facebook, called Room With a View, and Jen is always posting the most thought-provoking questions, like the one she shares here today. It’s one I wish I’d read back when I was teaching and constantly afraid I’d lose my job because of my vision.  I know Jen’s post will be an encouragement for many out there in the workplace!   Continue reading “Should I Tell My Workplace I’m Losing My Eyesight? (A Guest Post by Jen Walker)” →

DoubleVisionBlog Fight Song

View and share “DoubleVisionBlog Fight Song” Video on Facebook

Hi DoubleVisionBlog friends! I’ve been secretly working on this video for the past month as a surprise for Jenelle. Happy Blindness Awareness Month!

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In honor of Blindness Awareness month this October, Joy shares her journey of shame, vulnerability and courage. With both humor and insight, Joy and her twin sister, Jenelle, share their stories of life with RP at doublevisionblog.com. Continue reading “DoubleVisionBlog Fight Song” →

The Middle of Our Stories

Jenelle started me thinking about stories with her post last week. Awhile back I wrote a post that I was too embarrassed to publish, due to the vulnerability involved in sharing my lack of confidence at the time.  In light of the confidence I’ve gained in recent months, I’d like to share it here now, with some new insights.

I can see her.

Confident. Calm. Kind. Self-assured. Unassuming. Strong. Inviting. Gracious. Intelligent. Witty. Playful. Peaceful. Attractive. Insightful. Carefree.

She’s standing on the corner, cane in hand, waiting to cross, and she looks like she knows where she’s going. She’s approachable and aware. She accepts people the way she has accepted herself, fully. There is a lightness in her footsteps because she doesn’t take herself too seriously. She sees life as an adventure and not an emergency.

Continue reading “The Middle of Our Stories” →

Story

I just finished reading To Kill A Mockingbird.  Of course this was not my first time reading this modern classic, and it likely won’t be the last time I find myself engrossed in Harper Lee’s masterpiece.  The story has not changed in the 18 years since I last read it.  Yet, it somehow feels new to me.  While Scout, Jim, and Dill feel like long-lost friends, they also seem different from how I remember them.  While I recall feeling infuriated by the prejudice and injustices in the story, my understanding and analysis of these events has more depth than it did as a teenager.  My own life experiences over the last two decades influence how I interpret this powerful novel. (Side note – feeling so damn old as I write this) Continue reading “Story” →