[Critique Group 1] DeAnna's July Submission

Sat Jul 15 12:08:37 EDT 2023

1,113 words

Braille

By DeAnna Quietwater Noriega

Why braille is so important to me.  I was three years old, when my great
grandfather taught me to read.  He was a steelworker, who was self-educated.
In his nineties, he had the time to spend with a lively curious great grand
child.  He took me for walks and enjoyed teaching me the names of wild
flowers and to use big words to amaze my young mother.  His gnarled old
finger moved along a line of print in one of my children’s books or in his
huge old family Bible.  I read the words out loud or spell them if I didn’t
recognize them.  In which case, he said them for me.  By age six, I had lost
this loving man and print had become too blurred for me to see it clearly.
The world around me was a darker smaller place.   

Although she had never finished high school, my mother taught all of her
five children to love reading.  In fact, if she seemed inattentive at the
table, we could be sure that she was lost in the print on the back of the
cereal box or the label of the catsup bottle!  I became totally blind
shortly after my eighth birthday.  

It was then that braille came in to my life. Books were once more, open
doors to the world. My fingers literally did my walking through time; space
and anywhere the human mind could travel.  I never felt alone when other
children played games my blindness kept me from participating in if I had a
book to read.  Friends and wonderful adventures were there for me between
the pages of a Braille book.  I didn’t even miss the colorful illustrations
because the lines of braille permitted me to imagine the characters and
scenes as I wished.  I could familiarize myself with objects I would never
be able to explore with my own curious little hands.  I could meet people
and go places I would never know personally.  I taught sighted friends
Braille so that we could pass notes that the teachers couldn’t decipher,
even if they intercepted them.  Best of all, unlike my sighted siblings, I
could read in bed under the covers after the lights were out. 

Braille has allowed me to learn foreign languages; mathematics and even
enjoy leisure activities such as macramé, computers and knitting.  These
things would have been much harder to access if I had been limited to using
audio books.  It is so difficult to locate specific information on a long
recording.  Being a Braille user has made me capable of a greater
independence.  I can keep notes, mark clothing, canned goods and spices.  I
can locate places such as rest rooms and use elevators independently when
Braille signage is available.  When they were small, I shared my love of
books with my own children using print braille combination books we could
read together. 

As they grew older, I read some of my childhood favorites to them as they
dressed for school and ate breakfast.  Since I was a working mother, this
reading time was special replacing the bedtime reading my schedule no longer
permitted.  Braille notes helped me through high school.   I was the first
member of my large family to attain a college education. Although my
textbooks and lectures were recorded, I made voluminous braille notes for
study purposes. 

As a Peace Corps volunteer, Braille aided me in improving the lives of
Western Samoan children far from the availability of talking computers,
watches and calculators.  I used blocks of wood drilled with six holes in to
which wooden dowels were fitted to form braille letters.  Later, the class
moved on to forming words and sentences with rounded nail heads placed in
rows of smaller holes drilled in the pattern of a braille cell.  Eventually,
we did acquire Braille paper and Braillewriters.  I was able to train
transcribers and to develop a Braille code for the Samoan language.  Before
I left Western Samoa, work transcribing the Samoan Bible had begun and the
first blind child to be mainstreamed was attending high school. 

Because I can read Braille I am not a functional illiterate, without access
to the written word.  .  Braille books and magazines have filled otherwise
empty hours sitting in waiting rooms or riding on buses trains and planes.
A slate and stylus (no batteries required) have permitted me to write down
appointments, shopping lists, phone numbers, addresses etc.  When technology
has failed, old Braille files and notes have saved the day.  Braille maps
and diagrams have helped me grasp concepts that I would have had trouble
learning if limited to verbal descriptions.  Braille notations on important
printed papers have made it possible to locate them in files.  Braille games
such as scrabble, cards, and monopoly have permitted me to participate in
family fun.  Making braille dots with French knots on hair bands and other
small accessories helped me to dress attractively enabling me to coordinate
colors.  I could teach my sighted daughters their colors too by commenting
on them as I matched their clothing that was also marked with braille.
Exchanging braille letters with friends granted me a privacy in
correspondence I could not have had otherwise. Since early childhood, I have
loved putting my thoughts down on paper.  Even with the advent of talking
computers, I still find editing easier when I review an article or story on
a braille display.   Although I often listen to a novel on audio tape while
performing routine tasks, it is braille that I turn to for relaxed pleasure
reading.  When I wish to master a new skill, such as using an unfamiliar
computer program, I understand and learn more quickly if Braille
documentation is available.  When I became owner/manager of a pizza
franchise, I kept inventory and order lists in Braille.  My husband claims
that I inherited my mother’s failing and would read catsup labels too if
they were Brailed!  It is almost impossible to count the ways in which
Braille has impacted my life, enhancing my daily  existence. Independence,
leisure activities, educational assistance, competency as a business woman
and mother, are only the obvious areas where Braille has improved the
quality of my life. 

All this richness was mine because of six dots arranged two wide and three
high.  A young Frenchman who wanted to learn and know gave the world a great
gift.  The little girl, who first experienced it at her great grandfather’s
knee, regained the miracle of the written word through his efforts. She will
never be able to fully express her thanks or, imagine what her life would
have been like without Braille.  

1,108 words

Braille

By DeAnna Quietwater Noriega