Monday, January 30, 2006
The Blind Reading the Blind
The other day on the Metro ride home, everyone around me was reading. Including the blind lady sitting on the special-needs bench next to the door.
She was wearing a powder blue and gray windbreaker with maroon pants. Her hair was fluffy and gray, and her eyes were half-squinted, staring out at nothing. On her lap she had placed her purse, and on top of that was a big white blank book, which she ran her fingers across over and over.
I don't think I've ever seen anyone read Braille before. At least not that I can remember. I've always been fascinated with the fact that people can train their fingers to interpret those little dots and get information from them. I didn't know, however, exactly how it was done.
She was reading the Science News. (I know because halfway through the ride, she finished, and I watched as she closed it up and put it in her satchel--the title was printed in big bold letters on the front. They were the only words written in ink.) There were maybe 50 or so large (perhaps 12x14) pages stapled together. There were 23 lines to a page (I counted). She used the three big fingers of her right hand to slide across the page, while her left hand fished for the beginning of the next line. From time to time, she had to go back over a word or two to get them right, but the thing that astounded me the most was the speed with which she read. Back and forth, back and forth, then she got to the end of the page and she whipped it violently around as she turned it, flattened it on her purse, and began again.
As I watched her, I realized that she probably had to move so fast just to be able to keep her interest in what she was reading. After all, I imagine that the pattern of Braille dots takes a long time to make out a complete word--and extra long for a long word. Although she was ripping across the pages, she probably wasn't getting as much information per second as one would from spoken words. (Which begs the question: why didn't she listen to a recording of the Science News? Even I, a seeing person, when I was done watching her, turned on an audiobook recording.)
When she finished the Science News, she pulled out the New York Times. I wondered how she was able to find the articles she was interested in. It seemed that at first she skimmed the first couple of pages. She ended up stopping on page 3 or 4, and reading ferociously from there. I wished I could have read her thougts or at least even comprehended how she was doing what she was doing. How do you find the headline? If the article gets boring, how do you find the beginning of the next one?
We got to the stop before mine, and she stuffed the Times into her satchel, pulled out a collapsible cane, and marched off the train as suremindedly as she had been reading. By that time I had noticed that a couple of other people on the train had noticed her, and were perhaps as fascinated as I was. But most people were too busy reading to see the person who could not see, but who was also busy reading.
She was wearing a powder blue and gray windbreaker with maroon pants. Her hair was fluffy and gray, and her eyes were half-squinted, staring out at nothing. On her lap she had placed her purse, and on top of that was a big white blank book, which she ran her fingers across over and over.
I don't think I've ever seen anyone read Braille before. At least not that I can remember. I've always been fascinated with the fact that people can train their fingers to interpret those little dots and get information from them. I didn't know, however, exactly how it was done.
She was reading the Science News. (I know because halfway through the ride, she finished, and I watched as she closed it up and put it in her satchel--the title was printed in big bold letters on the front. They were the only words written in ink.) There were maybe 50 or so large (perhaps 12x14) pages stapled together. There were 23 lines to a page (I counted). She used the three big fingers of her right hand to slide across the page, while her left hand fished for the beginning of the next line. From time to time, she had to go back over a word or two to get them right, but the thing that astounded me the most was the speed with which she read. Back and forth, back and forth, then she got to the end of the page and she whipped it violently around as she turned it, flattened it on her purse, and began again.
As I watched her, I realized that she probably had to move so fast just to be able to keep her interest in what she was reading. After all, I imagine that the pattern of Braille dots takes a long time to make out a complete word--and extra long for a long word. Although she was ripping across the pages, she probably wasn't getting as much information per second as one would from spoken words. (Which begs the question: why didn't she listen to a recording of the Science News? Even I, a seeing person, when I was done watching her, turned on an audiobook recording.)
When she finished the Science News, she pulled out the New York Times. I wondered how she was able to find the articles she was interested in. It seemed that at first she skimmed the first couple of pages. She ended up stopping on page 3 or 4, and reading ferociously from there. I wished I could have read her thougts or at least even comprehended how she was doing what she was doing. How do you find the headline? If the article gets boring, how do you find the beginning of the next one?
We got to the stop before mine, and she stuffed the Times into her satchel, pulled out a collapsible cane, and marched off the train as suremindedly as she had been reading. By that time I had noticed that a couple of other people on the train had noticed her, and were perhaps as fascinated as I was. But most people were too busy reading to see the person who could not see, but who was also busy reading.
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