How the child in this family, learned to adapt himself to his own father’s handicap, translated…
In the ten short minutes I’d gone to his place to pick up something, I saw something that made a deep impression in me: the first, someone came to collect the cleaning fees, another, his wife going off to pick his son up from school.
In this family of three, only the child isn’t blind.
they can’t do like ordinary father and son do like this…not my photo…
He’d explained to me, after he’d paid the cleaning fees, that back when he was still single, he’d taken out the trash himself. With his guiding cane, getting closer to the garbage trucks, at first, he’d not known which bucket was for the fertilizer waste, which one was the slumps, but, he’d listened to the sound, the bucket with the slumps sounded hollower, the fertilizer bucket was heavier, and, he was able to easily differentiate between the two.
When his son was just two, he’d enjoyed watching how the garbage truck worked, felt that it looked like the hand of the bulldozer, that it could, lift all the trash into the bins with one movement, very interesting; and every time “The Maiden’s Prayers” sounded off, the father and son headed out together, the father accompanied the son to watch the garbage trucks, the son helped the father take out the trash, that was, a period of happy times, shared by the two of them.
He’d taken his son to school like ordinary parents do; nope, it’s safe to say, that his son guided him. The cross sections are very dangerous, the parents would always, pull the kids toward the side of the sidewalk, but for them, the child’s tiny hands were the ones, pulling the adult’s to the inside, to dodge the coming traffic, this gentle action showed, that since he was younger, he’d known to protect his adults.
There was a multiple way intersection in front of the child’s school, and the two of them made an agreement, that when the lights turned green, he’d stand still, and his child passes across the streets, and holler back at him, and he’d do the same, then, he’d ended the task of dropping his own son to school.
I’d asked him, “Do your classmates all know that you’re visually impaired?”, this roused up something that pained him in the past.
On one ordinary evening, he’d gone to school to pick up his son, but, it was, past the time they agreed on, his son still didn’t show, with the passing of time, he’d become, more and more, worried, hollered his son’s name aloud, but nobody answered; later his wife called him on his cell, “He’s already hone”, turns out, there was an older classmate who’d, coaxed him into teasing “the blind man”.
Up to here, we both, fell silent. He’d played with the ball in his hand, and, started another topic of conversation, “I’m a good pitcher, my son could hit the balls I’d pitched to him!”
His living room was very tidy, the furniture, close to the walls, with a squarish space in the middle, that was probably, his “pitcher’s mount”!
He’d calculated the distance, and thrown the ball toward the cabinets, to have the sticky ball stuck onto the cabinets, as he’d pulled the ball off, he’d, memorized the location, and kept practicing it. “But,” he’d made a sharpened turn of tone of voice, “once, my son hit the ball out………”, normally, as a pitcher, he couldn’t, catch it, but that time, he’d heard where the ball landed, the two of them fought for the ball, then, “BANG”, the two of them rammed into one another. The son was hurt, but, seeing his dad bled, he’d not dared to cry, just, rushed his father in to the nearby clinic to get treated. And because only the child could see, the doctor told the child, “Look, I had, stitched your dad, I did a good job, didn’t I?”, and, after the injuries were dressed, and the medication picked up, when they’d gotten back home, his son sat quietly on the couch, didn’t move a single muscle. Back then, he was too young, couldn’t say, but his body showed, that it was, shock, the child was, forced to, grow up so soon, mature too early like so.
“I would get called in by his teacher, normally, not for anything good, but occasionally, there were, wonderful news too.” No matter what, their son always wanted his parents, to get out of the classrooms; but he’d believed, that if something happened to his son at school, then, the parents should face it, and, if the child performed well, then the parents should share his pride and joy too, and, although the visually impaired parents are, specially, but regardless, they’re, still parents, and he’d told his son, “Although daddy can’t see, but, I’m no trouble, you’d helped me often, and, I’d taken care of you too; walking together, maybe people will think we’re, weird, it’s okay, we can face this together, because we’re a family, and, families are supposed to, help each other out.”
As I’d left him, and waited for the bus at the bus stop, I saw his hand, on his son’s shoulders. And his son smiled lightly, at other people’s looking at them weird; perhaps, he’s telling himself inside, “he’s my dad, we’re, a family”.
And so, imagine how hard it must be, for the family, and yet, this family still established a way that works for them, and the child learned to disregard how other’s perceived he and his father’s interactions, and, they’re a good family together.
Life, the Obstacle Course 