Whenever a person discovers something about themselves as an adult that has been present or growing since childhood, they inevitably think about the signs they may have missed; things that would have tipped them off sooner, given them a clue to the journey ahead.
A few months ago, I was going through some old photos from when I was a small child. I came across a picture that was taken on a beach in Mexico when I was about three years old. My eyes were squinted against the glare of the sun and I was reaching for a pair of sunglasses that were perched on a rock nearby. I looked desperate to escape the bright sunlight and it is a look I recognize. Growing up in California, my family was always going to the beach and wanting to bask in the sun, but I always preferred the cloudy days. They all thought I was strange or moody, but even then, the sun actually hurt my eyes.
As I got older, I was called clumsy because I was always tripping and stubbing my toes and knocking things over. I couldn’t hit a softball in P.E. class or catch the ball when I was forced into the outfield. I appeared careless, unathletic, always in a day-dream, but I was actually going blind.
When I was learning to drive, I remember being in the car one afternoon with my mom, who began shrieking that I was driving too close to the edge of the road and that we were going to go off the cliff. My mom was prone to drama and there wasn’t really a cliff, just a five-inch drop off the road into the dirt. She thought I wasn’t paying attention, but I actually couldn’t see the side of the road.
Into my 20’s I continued to trip and fall and live up to my reputation as either the clumsy day dreamer or the girl who has had too much to drink. I had a friend tell me I was the only 24-year-old she knew who actually fell down and skinned her knees. I missed curbs and crashed into street lamps and nursed the bruises that peppered my skin. I thought perhaps I was drinking too much, but actually the edges of the world were disappearing and I didn’t even know it.
Today, the signs are of things to come rather than pre-cursors to what has arrived. I wait for the markers of my deteriorating vision, notice how the glare of the sun gets meaner and how once effortless tasks are becoming more difficult. And some days I am moody. Some days I am careless. Some days I dream. And some days I drink too much.
Stories From the Edge of Blindness 
March 14, 2012 at 6:30 pm
Some days you are funny
Some days you are cute
Some days you are stubborn
Some days you apologize too much
Some days you don’t give yourself credit
But you are always kind, compassionate, understanding.
Yes and some days you drink too much!
XX
March 24, 2012 at 7:13 pm
So often it seems we can only retroactively understand the life that is unfurling through us. Perhaps we recognize the slow deterioration of hearing, or movement, or vision. Perhaps we observe the effects of a lifetime spent working at learning to be kind and creative. There is something powerful about the act of perceiving the seeds of the present in the past, and the origins of the future in the present. In the cultivation of relationships with those about whom we care deeply, and activities that feed our being, we may make a future where there is hope and love, even as we experience fear and heartache.
April 8, 2012 at 6:59 pm
Eloquently said.
March 26, 2012 at 4:54 am
I remember barrelling into a wall at full sprint at the age of ten. It was dusk and I was playing tag with my friends. I think my hind brain thought I had reached a corner and so I turned into it, only to find I had turned too soon. I was wearing glasses and I still have little scars where the frames cut into my brow and cheek. As you say, you don’t realise till later just what was going on.
Of course it’s not always an unpleasant experience. As a teen I had a funny experience in the cinema. We arrived late and I was making my way to my seat in the narrow walkway, popcorn box in hand, when I tripped and fell into a delightful ladies lap. My friends accused me for months afterwards of having done it deliberately!
R
April 8, 2012 at 6:54 pm
I love the cinema story. You are good at finding the positive!!!