[nfb-talk] UK Vision Strategy

Sat Dec 29 20:39:29 CST 2007

Dear Helene,

It is very nice to hear back from you.  I hope that this will be one of many
exchanges we will have in the future.
You may be across and ocean, but you are just as near as the next internet
post.  
You are not alone.   You have many brothers and sisters here who are just
waiting to get to know you better.
I hope that we may meet one day.  You maybe the person who lights a new fire
in your countrymen.  You could be the one that begins the rally.
We are here to help how ever we can.  We are here to talk to and confide in.
Let us just keep talking and exchanging ideas and information.
We might begin by telling each other more about ourselves.
I am 60 years old and I live in the infamous Boca Raton Florida.
I was, for many years, a working Nuclear/Aerospace Materials Engineer.  I
now work in Public Transit services.
I became legally blind at the age of 16 due to RP.  I was a NAVY brat and
have lived all over the World from Alaska to Australia.  I never went to the
same school, two years in a row, until I went to college.    
I did not find out that I was legally blind until I was 20 years old and I
was working as a Fireman/Para-Medic while attending college in Florida.
I had grown up with my blindness and just learned how to cover it up so well
and fake it that no one ever suspected I was legally blind.  I learned how
to cheat and get around the eye test by memorizing the standard eye charts
used by most doctors and the Department of Motor Vehicles.
I had a driver's license and drove for over 20 years.
It was while I was working as a Fireman/Para-Medic that I learned that I was
legally blind.  This still did not stop me from driving and infact, I was so
deep in denial that I did not believe it.  I, instead, just became more
careful to avoid exposing myself.
It was also at this time that I was selected for the '68 U.S. Olympic Team
and got a scholarship to San Jose State University in California. 
 I graduated and took Master's classes at Stanford and Cal Berkley.  I was
also a member of the '69 N.C.A.A. National Championship Track Team and the
Pan American Team too.  
It was also here that I began working for Lockheed Space and Missiles Lunar
Rover Labs while attending College and was part of their Engineer in
Training Program.  .
I built the Lunar Rovers that went to the Moon in '71-'72 with Apollo
missions 15-16-17.
I then worked in special projects including the F-117-A Stealth Fighter
Program.
I left Lockheed and worked for a year for the Stanford Research Institute
and Linear Accelerator as a Contractor.    Then worked for General
Electric-Nuclear Energy Division until '79.
I got married in '76 and in '79, I moved my family to Florida and worked as
a department head for a aviation hydraulic company.
In '85, I had to stop driving.  It was at this time that I really started to
have to deal with my blindness.  After a year of struggling to get back and
forth to work, in another county, I had to give up my job and go on
disability for the first time in my life.  I could still do my job, but I
just could not get to the job.
Public transit at the time , in this area, was very bad.  It was totally
unusable for going to work.  Taxi cabs were too hard to get and too costly.
I sat at home, very depressed for a time.
Then I decided to do something about it.  I found out where and when the
County Commissioners met and I began to attend the meetings to speak up for
Public Transit.  I figured that if I had this problem; likely allot of
others did too.
It was also about this time that I found and joined the NFB.
At first it seemed to be just a little social group of 7 to 10 blind people
who met once a month.
We formed a Chapter right here in my town and I became the Vice-President.
The second year, after elections, I became the Chapter Treasurer and a
couple of new people became our leaders and they had some knowledge of the
NFB organization.  The only thing was that every time we raised some funds,
they would come to the Board and ask for funds to go attend a Convention or
something.
They did this a few times and always came back very excited, but we felt
that we got a better description of Mrs. Mauer's dress than we did useful
information.
Anyway, the next time they came asking for funds the Board gave it to them
,but sent another person along also: Me.
I attended my first Washington Seminar.  This was the first time in my life
that I saw real examples of just what a good, well trained blind person
could be like.  I did not even carry a long white cane at this time in my
life because I was ashamed and afraid of the stigma.  
For the first time, I saw blind people exploring the city freely and
independently using their white canes and guide dogs.  I saw them reading
Braille the same way I use to read print.
I took part , with them, in advocating with our Congress and Senate for laws
that could really help Blind people.
I was more impressed than I was when one of my Lunar Rovers was used on the
Moon.
I came back like a man with his hair on fire.  I worked to strengthen our
chapter so much that we grew from only 15 members to 203 members in one
year.  So many members that we had to split the chapter and form a new one
in the next county.
I became the Chapter President and we took on the transportation issue as
our chapter project.
We lobbied our county commissioners for more funding and got a new local gas
tax passed to fund it over allot of opposition from the conservative Right
Wing.

I was appointed to serve on 3 boards that oversee transit services in our
area.
Our transit got better and finally good enough that more people could use it
to get to work and all of the other things that we must do to live.
Finally, a transit company asked me to come to work for them and I did.
That is what I am still doing today.  Next month, I will be going to
Washington again to take part in our annual lobbying of the Congress on the
behalf of All Blind persons in the U.S.  Maybe this why we have it better
here than you do in the U.K.  
We are politically active and speak up for ourselves.
Maybe this is what the Blind of the U.K. need to do to get some respect and
some services.
If we can help, just ask.

I hope that I have not bored you to death with this, but I thought you
should know something about me and as you don't know me, I thought I should
go first. I look forward to hearing about you and your life.  I believe that
we all have a story to tell and much we can teach as well as learn from each
other.

Sincerely, Your friend across the pond.

David Evans, NFBF

-----Original Message-----
From: nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nfb-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of helene ryles
Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2007 9:45 AM
To: nfb-talk at nfbnet.org
Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] UK Vision Strategy

Thanks David and Kenneth for your responses.  Unfortunately there really
isn't anything like NFB, that I know of.  We don't even have a national
rehabilitation centre any more.  We used to have one at Torquey. I don't
think it was ever as good as the NFB ones but it was the only thing we had,
but it got closed down.  Now you are dependant on social services and that
varies. In Birmingham there is a rehabilitation centre. It's not bad and I
found them very supportive as I'd just left my flatmates and didn't have a
proper  place of my own. Just my friend's sofa.  It isn't at all like the
NFB ones though. They don't do training under blind folds. They don't have
any braille displays or internets. They teach you individual routes. I
didn't even know there was a differant way to teach mobility before I looked
at the NFB website. In some area's there just isn't anything.  

  Unfortunately RNIB and guide dog association seem to want to do away with
national  residentual centres in favor of local ones.  I trained with Jilli
at a residentual center at Lemmington spa. Just being in a drug free
environment did me a world of good and after getting Jilli I left that sort
of life style behind which I may not have done if I'd been trained at the
kind of environment I was living in at the time. 

  I will totally agree that USA does seem forward where disabilities are
concerned.  Not just with Blindness but with Deafness as well. In fact I'm
learing things that are happening in my own country affecting the Deaf from
a USA message board. 

  The problem is there is a limit as to what 1 person can do, especially if
that one person isn't particularly sociable and in my case being legally
blind is definately the  lesser of my various disabilities.  I'm sure there
are other independant blind people in UK.  They used to read their letters
in New Beacon (RNIB magazine) but they seem to have gone quiet lately so
wether they've simply given up or formed another group that I'm not aware
of, I really don't know. They aren't reachable via the internet. I've
looked.

  Thanks again for your support,
  Helene Ryles.

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