rant one: the narrow tunnel
In no particular temporal order, allow me to list some of the most unusual thing's I've had the honor of doing:
1. eaten dog meat (kinda chewy)
2. lived in a Zen Buddhist temple in Nara, Japan
3. prayed at the Western Wall on Shabbat morning
4. worked as a tarantula handler volunteer for the San Diego zoo
5. parasailed
6. slept overnight in a museum
6a. a boating museum
6b. on a boat
6c. that is my parent's, and that we live on for an extended period of time
(see also: waking up in a different state than one fell asleep in with the commands of my father, "sh*t, we need to run a line off the stern")
7. swam with dolphins- in the middle of the open ocean, off the back of said boat
8. drove a nascar race car
9. won my first computer in a raffle
9a. and several hundred dollars in the same weekend, from a completely different raffle
9b. and housing at my university, from a random drawing
10. walking into school, having been absent the day before, with the excuse, "sorry, but my family's house was in the middle of the ocean, caught in a hurricane"
11. on the previous topic of food, also having eaten: alligator, rattlesnake, congealed pig's blood, jellyfish, and cockroaches. I liked everything except the blood- too salty.
12. gored Vic Mignogna with one of my cosplays (accident! I swear!)
13. got into a snowball fight on the Great Wall
14. climbed Masaddah and watched the sun rise from its peak
15. lived in extreme poverty without electricity, drinkable water, or toilets for an immersive homestay
16. taken four years of gourmet cooking classes
and yet, there's always this one caveat, one little sidenote whispered by my mother when anything like this ever came up- or anything having to do with my schoolwork, grades, etc.
Oh, and she's also legally blind.
Correlation ≠ causation (if you have a , that's the option key and =, by the way)
So I'm legally blind. I have serious tunnel vision (can only see straight ahead, need to turn head to see to the sides), and I'm photophobic (light sensitive, not afraid of it! what, you think I'm a vampire?
…)
due to being an albino (again vampire? seriously?)
(I mean, I used to think that would be cool. Then Twilight got released).
Having ended that sentence, I'd like to go back to the topic at hand.
I dunno. I don't know what else to say. I don't like that my eyesight is a whisper tacked on at the end of all of my achievements (S------ sewed this bag! It looks professional! And, did you know that S------ is also legally blind! Really! She's amazing!)Or that my achievements are being mentioned, because, were it not for the (mostly available) anonymity of the intertubes I wouldn't be talking about all this stuff. I'm not one for gloating.
But that's not something that is in my control or my fault, anyway. What really bothers me is when I've done (or failed to do) something because of my eyes. I can't look at a menu board at a fast food restaurant and order for my group of friends. I can't recognize when someone is waving at me from across the street. Or next to me. I can't recognize faces and all that crap.
And it hurts, because I know that, with all of my achievements, awards, laurels, and good grades, paintings painted, cakes decorated and dresses sewn, people forget that I cannot see. And when I don't wave back, people get insulted. Like I don't care.
And it's because I can never not care that I can't sleep at night.
("rant two: do geese see god and other bad palindromes" next)
