Back on my handicapable rant again, so hold on!
Today is a sort of uneventful day. My big responsibility today is waiting for the dishwasher repair guy to come. I get to clean up the mouse poop when he pulls the machine away from under the counter. Wow.
So I got up late. Still running around in jammies until about 9:30. Then I said to myself “get dressed, girl! You are not making a habit of this!” I got dressed and started to think.
Now me thinking is always a dangerous proposition. Weirdly fertile mind here. But what I thought about was this: if and when I retire what am I going to do with myself?
And what am I going to do with myself since ‘myself’ is now visually impaired?
Looking online I made a discovery. Everyone wants to help us and nobody wants us to help them! Now I might be wrong – and considering my eyesight I very well could have read it wrong – but there did not appear to be one single site devoted to things visually impaired, low vision, whatever folks were capable of volunteering for.
Now granted, we are all different and we all have different capabilities and interests. Also, we are not all THAT different from the fully sighted. We just can’t see! Maybe people just think we will go to our club or our church and find some way to contribute. But do you know what I think? I think a lot of people don’t.
So what would I do? Maybe take my CCTV to a day care and be a volunteer ‘grandma’. I was working in a preschool the other day and every child had to examine a stuffed animal or a book on the CCTV before I could get to work.
Kids are wonderfully accepting and accommodating. I was just the nice lady who could not see too well.
Maybe I would volunteer with the local animal rescue group. I imagine I will still be able to walk dogs and clean cages. Cleaning up dog poop may trump vacuuming up mouse poop!
So maybe I have half a plan. You – or at least I – can only watch so much daytime TV before I curl up in the fetal position on the floor. I can only “do lunch” so many times. Might as well do something productive. But as for ideas? I think we are all on our own.
Linda here: Since Sue wrote this, I’ve been able to find one webpage that talks about volunteering for folks with low vision. Click here for Finding Volunteer Positions As an Individual Who Is Blind or Visually Impaired.