Fat Man/Fit Town

So, a blind Jew and an ordained minister are planning a bike ride in Israel…

Sounds like the start of a joke, right? But it’s true. Let me tell you why.

As I’ve explained before, I’ve been slowly losing my sight for many years, and more than a decade ago I had to give up riding a bike on my own (after giving up driving a few years before that). I really didn’t think I would ever become a regular rider again, until I bought a (somewhat unusual) tandem about a year ago. Now I can go on rides around beautiful Boulder with my friend and co-worker Derek Brouwer, who is a strong enough rider to be able to captain that great beast of a bike. Derek and I regularly go on rides at lunchtime, and recently managed to complete 85 miles at the Colorado Buff Classic bike ride.

A few months ago, I got an email from Camp Ramah, advertising a fundraiser for their special needs camping program (Tikvah, or Hope). Through these programs, they are able to provide, in addition to their regular camps, Jewish camping experiences for children, teens and adults with mental, physical, and emotional challenges (including blindness and low vision). Because I was fortunate enought to work at a Ramah camp (in Massachusetts) for a summer in high school, and my son, Daniel, was a camper during the inaugural summer at Ramah Outdoor Adventure here in Colorado, I have a warm spot in my heart for the Ramah camping movement. This seemed like a terrific cause I could support on many levels.

The fundraiser is a week-long bike ride through Southern Israel, beginning in Jerusalem and ending in Eilat, with many stops in between (including Shabbat in Mitzpei Ramon, near the Ramon Crater). I looked at the email and thought: “This sounds like fun, and what a great cause!” So I walked over to Derek’s office and said, “Hey, Derek, how’d you like to ride the tandem around the Negev for a week next Spring?” And he said, “I’ll ask my wife.” Derek’s wife, Jane, being a extraordinarily wonderful woman, told him to go for it. So we signed up. Now, Derek is, in fact, an ordained minister. He has a deep respect for Judaism, and a fascination with the history of both our religious traditions. He’s never been to Israel, so he’s very happy to have a chance to see quite a bit of it on two wheels, and to support a worthy endeavor while he’s at it. But, honestly, he’s mostly doing this for me. He’s a kind man, and knows I wouldn’t be able to do a ride like this without him.

I also can’t do a ride like this without you. We have committed, between us, to raise $7200 for Camp Ramah’s special needs programs. Please go to my donation page to give. From there, you can go to Derek’s page, and to the main page describing the ride and our cause.

Thank you so much for your generous support.

Edges are important to me. And very, very dangerous.

About two and half years ago, I wrote a little about having retinitis pigmentosa and what it’s like to be blind, but not completely blind. RP is degenerative, so things have not gotten better. And they haven’t stayed the same, either. From one day to the next, my vision seems about the same, but it’s pretty clear that, in the past couple of years, and perhaps even more dramatically in the past year, things are worse.

On the plus side, I can still get around on my own via foot or public transit, as long as I’m reasonably familiar with the surroundings. I can do my work without needing special accesibility tools (a big mouse pointer and light on dark text are sufficient for most things). I’ve accomodated pretty well to wearing bifocals (in fairness, that’s probably more a function of age than the RP). And I am not, you know, dying or anything dire. OK, that last was too much. Really, my life is pretty good. I have a loving family, a job, good friends, and I want for nothing.

But, still…

Edges, edges everywhere, and, with luck, not a drop off into the drink.

My useful visual field is very narrow. Don’t know how narrow, as I haven’t bothered to have it measured recently, but suffice it to say that narrow describes it pretty well. When your useful visual field is effectively a small disk, it helps immensely to be able to follow edges.

Sidewalks on a normal, rectilinear street grid have these marvelous edges known as curbs. I love them. I just keep my eye on the edge, and I can navigate a fairly straight path down the sidewalk. Of course, I do risk crashing into the odd pole or fire hydrant or pedestrian while concentrating on that edge, but that’s why I carry the white cane.

Edges are everywhere for me, and quite essential. The edge where the molding meets the floor helps me avoid the walls (but not necessarily the wall hangings projecting out from it). The edges of windows on my computer screen help me to navigate my self around to the part of the display I need. The edges of the counter and the kitchen table…well, their utility should be obvious by now.

But, as essential as they are, all these useful edges are a challenge. After all, as I said, following them too closely leads me to miss other, rather important things, some more hazardous than others. I misjudged a step the other day, one foot went down about six inches off the (non-street) sidewalk, and I caught myself, badly, on a rustic fence that gave me a couple of good bruises. That was an accident.

But sometimes I dread deliberately stepping off those edges. Who knows if there’s a drop much longer than I can perceive. Who knows if there’s a car coming down the street as I step off that curb (I do look–and listen–for this, but there’s still a little clench just at the moment).

I need to think more about edges. Seems like there’s a metaphor here for something else, but I’m perceiving them quite literally at the moment.