This site is about visual impairment and maximizing use of functional vision.  I choose this focus neither to deny my legal blindness nor to suggest that relying on one’s eyes to accomplish tasks is preferable to using blind skills, be it braille or a white cane.

There are solid reasons why Special Education and organizations such as the National Federation of the Blind seek to eliminate distinctions among levels of vision loss.  Praise for accomplishing tasks visually stigmatizes blindness, encourages reliance on a diminished sense, and discourages the development of skills that might afford students greater confidence and independence.

Still, there are legally blind people who ride bikes, drive cars (using a bioptic lens), and who find reading regular print using large print, screen readers, and audiobooks more flexible and efficient than braille.

Quantifying visual acuity and defining skills and deficiencies compared with the totally blind and the fully sighted is an ongoing challenge.  Using the word “blind” confuses most sighted people and political pressure to use an inaccurate term fosters as much isolation as it does unity.

In the absence of scientific studies of low-vision life experiences, I’ll offer this profile of my vision.

My visual acuity is 20/200 due to ocular albinism, a genetic condition that skews optic nerve tracking and reduces the number of cones (photoreceptors responsible for perceiving fine detail) in the retina.

In my experience, strategizing solutions for perceiving fine detail, e.g. street signs or restaurant menus, presents challenges, but is far from being a daily struggle.

Here are a few observations:

• I play catch with a baseball; my partner is shocked to learn I am legally blind.  I hold the sports page up to face my face to read a box score and he wonders how I get around at all
• I run a 5K, enjoying the scenery, but when the resulted are taped to a wall, I am shocked at how far away people can read them from
• Watching “The Simpsons,” I have unfaltering visual orientation, but can’t read the blackboard or church sign messages
• In all my years of cycling, I’ve never missed a sign or streetlight; hit a pothole, pedestrian, or barricade, or failed to know where I was at all times.  Seeing dashboard instruments or other drivers’ gestures is a concern that has kept me from driving
• I read print using glasses and a magnifying glass, but were I to rely on these alone, I’d read 2-3 books a year rather than 50.

I hope others with low vision will share their experiences so we can move towards a more realistic perception of our abilities and a more efficient use of tools and technologies.