BLINDED AGAIN

by

Vicki E Slaughter

 

            Alone. So terribly alone. I haven't felt the darkness enclose me like this in a long time. I open my eyes and bitterly realize that the empty stage still has broken lights. It's so black without the lights.

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            I've had to face this night forever since that drunken driver shuttered the windows to my soul with a finality no doctor could repair. But that moment was long ago, I don't want to re-live those angry emotions all over again. I fought so hard for so long to rid myself of such stifling rage. But the anger...and the fear are back, and I don't know if I can stand it. I just don't know if I can…stand…it…again.

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            Oh God, how black the day is.

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            Alone. I feel so terribly alone...and confused by sounds that I understood so clearly, earlier. I hurt myself jogging on the Mall near the Smithsonian today. I tripped and fell...hard! I tripped over nothing. Hell, it must have been nothing, I couldn't see it could I? Oh God, of course not! But it is what I get for thinking I can do things that I used to do...before I became bl...I can't say the word outright. I always rephrase and say before the days became as black as the nights.

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            I must have wandered around the bus depot for hours, because I am very hungry now. I’m not sure how I even found it. I started my adventure around 4:30PM just before I was to catch my usual bus and head home. I lost my sense of direction when I stumbled, so I'm not even sure I caught the right train or that this is the correct station. It seemed right when I first stepped off the train, but now...

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            It got cold while I wandered around this place...too proud to ask questions. Fool! But I won't ask and be pitied. My stomach is beginning to churn and I do not feel at all well. I have to make a choice, but I cringe at the thought of getting on any bus, especially the wrong one. I'm so nervous I can feel my hands quivering...and I am overwhelmed by a fear of the dark, of all things. If only the lights that I know are shining about me were lighting my way again. If only...

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            I hear a bus coming towards me. I finally broke down and asked someone the time, so I know I must board some bus. There won't be many more arriving. I've almost delayed too long to get home. To call my family now and plead a ride home is more than my pride can take. Oh, pride...foolish pride. Still, I must get home on my own. And yet, I know I must ask for some assistance to find the right bus to board, so I carefully maneuver over to the spot where I hear the motor of a bus rumbling. I ask the driver where his route goes and he says he goes near my home. Good. It seems like I may have almost made it home despite myself. If I can just last out!

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            So alone...and so scared.

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            The blackness is overwhelming my other senses. Senses I had finally learned to use over the years. It does not help that just being on this bus makes my queasy stomach churn all the more. The driver tells me there is a seat behind him. I reach out, and with his hand guiding mine, find his chair and use it to assist me into the empty seat.

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            Finding the vacant spot on what my memory says must be the long bench seat usually located just behind the driver, I cautiously sit down. God, but I'm petrified.

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            It's lonely here in the dark. Almost like sitting in a closet. Noises are muted and you can see nothing. I wish my stomach would stop protesting. I'd give into its demands if I just knew what they were. Lord, if this bus would just get going! The sooner we start, the sooner I can get home...although I'm terribly afraid I don't know where that is any more. I'm so directionally messed up that I'm not certain I know which way to turn after I step off the bus. Right or left? Straight ahead or back around the bus? Which way is home? God! Which way is home? Alone. So alone.

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             I feel as a child must when forced to move about in a world made for adults. It's an appropriate image. Children are afraid of the dark, too. And this world no longer works for me, as it was never made to accommodate children. That difficulty will one day change for them. It will never again fit me as it once did.

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             And the total lack of any sight! Perhaps if I didn't feel so rotten, the darkness wouldn't enclose me so. It's like I’m in some huge snow globe...in a world all my own. I don't like this lonely feeling! I don't like being apart. I don't like the feebleness my difference forces me to recognize. I feel so terribly helpless right now. And I don't doubt that my pride has brought me to this.

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            Unexpectantly, I hear a familiar voice. "Mrs. T?"  A slight rustle and suddenly, I'm not alone any more. I grip her knee. Tina. It's my neighbor's eldest daughter Tina and my daughter’s friend. She places her hand on mine, oohing softly when she sees the scrapes on my knuckles. I'd forgotten about that awful fall. My knees were scraped, too, and were now sticking to my pant legs. I hadn’t realized all the injuries I’d acquired until the stinging pain I got when I moved my leg.

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             "It's all right, Mrs. T. I'll help you get home. You really banged yourself up!"  She gently pats my hand and starts to tell me about her day and the funny events that occurred during it. Or, at least, they're funny the way she tells me about them.

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            So soothing to hear her familiar voice. It was kind of Tina to ignore the possibility of rejection from me and offer succor to a woman known in the neighborhood to be rudely protective of her independence despite her handicap of no sight.  Strangely enough...or perhaps, not so strangely...the darkness is fading.

 

             It isn't so ink black now. I began to recognize and separate the sounds I swirling around me. This security I feel is due to Tina. I was wrong to believe that I shouldn't require aid...to push away the people who tried to help me despite my rejection of them. The proud often fall before seeing the light. Everyone needs assistance at some point...it isn't weak to require it. It has taken me far too long to recognize this fact of life. People need people.

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            I still can't see the world around me. But the darkness no longer enfolds me within its frightening depths. And my other senses have been set free. I'm never totally without vision as long as my other four senses thrive.

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            My stomach is churning, and I ache all over from my scrapes and bruises, but I feel so much better!

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             I'm not alone...now. And the blind one is finally beginning to see.