Mama's got eyes in the back of her head... which is good since the front ones are busted

My six-year-old daughter has finally figured out that I'm legally blind. 

"Mama! Mama! Get that wasp!"

"Mama! Mama! What is that up in that tree?" 

"Mama! Mama! Why are people staring at us?" 

Image by Ember Farnam

I've gotten around these issues for years with basic Mama-hacks. Wasps?  Keep the doors closed, skillfully wave towels and keep the baking soda handy.

Things up in trees or across the street?  Ask detailed questions of the child until you can figure out what it is. Teach them letters and numbers early.

People staring?  Sigh.

"Honey, some people are confused when they see someone who is different. They might be staring at my stick or at my eyes. That's okay. They aren't hurting anything."

(What I don't say--yet--is that they might also be staring because we're speaking a foreign language or because our skin tones don't match the way families "should." There are so many reasons to stare. Pick one.)

But now my daughter has got the idea. I've explained,"My eyes don't work very good. If you want me to see things, you have to bring them really really close."

We're currently reading the American Girl books about the Native American girl from our neck of the woods in Oregon, Kaya, and her adopted sister Speaking Rain.  My daughter was a bit confused about why Speaking Rain couldn't run away from the bad guys who captured her when Kaya could. She didn't accept that Speaking Rain had to be led around all the time.

"Mama, you can't see and you run around by yourself anyway," she argued. 

The American Girl books did a decent job on including a blind character, although there are a few points that might be a little unrealistic. Mostly they do well. I try to explain that the girl in the story can't see anything at all. Whereas I can see some. But that is hard for a six-year-old to work out. She looks really confused again. 

And she's not the only one who is confused. It seems like every month or so, someone asks me how I parent while legally blind. So I've decided to set down the issues here for quick reference. There are a few points I'd like to emphasize about blind and visually impaired parenting:

Illustration using a Creative Commons image by Jake Stimpson

1. It isn't impossible, and no, I don't have a nanny or a cleaner or a cook.
2. There are physically hard parts and parenting is possibly the most difficult thing I've ever done in terms of adapting to my vision impairment. (Sighted parents usually say parenting is the hardest thing they've ever done too.)
3. We've never been to the emergency room and my kids have never been injured because I couldn't see a danger.
4. As with everything involving disabilities, the hardest parts are social and coming from other people.

I've built rock walls with my bare hands. I love bicycling. I have hiked in remote areas of the Himalayas alone. I have worked as a newspaper journalist covering the war in Kosovo and Macedonia. I have navigated traffic in Moscow, Russia and Dhaka, Bangladesh alone and on foot, and that should be considered an extreme adrenaline sport. 

I'm not totally blind, but I'm definitely legally blind. And my own personal opinion is that parenting is the single most challenging task I've tried when it comes to the difficulty of adapting it too my vision impairment. It has been harder than all of those other things when it comes to the specific difficulties of a vision impairment. So, yes, there are some difficulties. 

Let's see, here are the physical issues:

• Choking hazards and similar toddler dangers: I had to design my living space so that there simply aren't any choking hazards, sharp objects and medicines within reach when my kids were babies and toddlers. Otherwise my days would have been full of constant worry and mouth sweeping. I quickly learned to tell what my children were doing by sound. While sighted parents would watch their kids and have trouble when they hid under the table to draw on the floor with a sharpie, I listened. I learned to listen for the sounds of pen lids, scissors and batteries rattling on the floor. It only took my toddler cutting up a ten-dollar bill left on the table once before I hid all scissors and all money. I will often be cooking with my hands full and tell my kids in the other room something like, "Bring me those batteries right now, You don't take the batteries out of your toys and batteries aren't toys." My kids ask "Mama, how did you know?" I tell them, "That's a Mama's trade secret." By now I know the sounds made when my kids play with dolls, trucks, sticker books, anything. They may be small sounds but if they're playing with something legitimate, there is always some sound. Utter silence, as all parents know, usually means it's time to check on them. 
• Eye contact and attachment: Eye contact is a big attachment mechanism for infants. They can do it in other ways, but most of these require a lot of physical closeness. So, instead of eye contact I did a lot of snuggling. My children sat on my lap to eat until they were at least two. Food plus physical touch and/or eye contact equals attachment brain chemistry. 
• Physical safety and falls: Gates are a very good thing for toddlers. I can keep toddlers from falling without gates but it is too much work. It makes more sense to gate an area and let the kids loose. Then I can get some cooking done. On the other hand, kids will fall. Sighted parents rarely catch tumbles. I have miraculously caught toddlers vaulting head first off the couch just as many times as my sighted peers. I could feel and hear there the kid was and where he/she was headed. I've also had them crash when I was across the room, just as sighted parents have. I keep a well-stocked first aid cupboard. And my kids are now older and have a good sense of physical safety because they know that it hurts if you do overly risky things.
• Traffic:  I didn't always use a white cane. I traveled around in my twenties and just used sound, luck and speed to get across busy streets. But as I got older I knew the odds were rigged against me. I started using a white cane for traffic safety a few years before I had kids and I have to say to anyone who is legally blind and cane-resistant as I was: If you have kids, you need to get with the stick. Kids don't run very fast when they're little and they don't always listen. Canes make drivers pay a bit more attention and what parent wouldn't want an extra safety device. I taught my kids about the dangers of traffic at a very young age. I still make them hold my hands to cross roads at the ages of four and six, but they are getting rebellious, so I'm teaching them how to cross. Soon they'll probably be holding my hand to keep me from getting run over. 
• Combining strollers and canes: This is a special kind of issue, just one of sheer logistics. If I thought cars and pedestrians would use their brains sufficiently, I would simply attach a cane to the front of the stroller as a signalling device and let'er rip. But in my town the thinking abilities of drivers are not to be trusted with the safety of infants. So, I resort to the somewhat ridiculous method of carrying a cane while pushing a stroller. Obviously the cane is just in the way at that point and not doing me any good in terms of physical navigation, but I mostly need it as a signalling device for traffic anyway. When I approach an intersection, I turn the stroller around and pull it while walking with the cane out in front, to make sure that the drivers can get the message. I have also used a sling and a baby carrier but I have problems with my feet and knees that make long treks while carrying a toddler impossible and then there was the era when I had two toddlers. So, I just used a stroller most of the time. Oddly enough, no one ever seemed to notice that my cane wasn't helping me to navigate. Sighted people usually don't really know much about how white canes are used.
• Deep water: Yes, parents should teach their children about the dangers of deep water early too, as well as teach them to swim early. But unlike drivers, water won't ever "be careful." My kids and I are out and about in nature a lot and there have always been rivers and ponds around.  My approach that I stay very close to a small child around water. And I've learned that sighted parents often underestimate the dangers of water precisely because they think they will be able to see everything. When my son was a baby, I was sitting one day by a noisy rushing river with my husband, toddler and infant. I was changing the diaper and my fully sighted husband was reading while our two-year-old daughter played by the bank of the river. I happened to glance up and see her shadow against the water and then glance back down to tuck in the diaper and then glance up again and her shadow was gone. There was no audible sound at all because the rushing of the water drowned out her scream, but I knew with mother's instinct. I leaped up and launched myself into the river and grabbed her while she flailed in the water. She had already been swept away behind bushes and trees where my husband couldn't see her. The first my husband knew of the problem I already had her. He never saw her go in and because of the noise of the water neither of us could hear her splash or scream. It was only instinct and my attention to the bits of shadow that I can see that saved the day that time. And it emphasized to me that neither sight nor hearing is a guarantee of protection, especially if you take it for granted. The best protection is paying attention and being aware of your surroundings. 
• Finding children: There came a time when my toddlers realized that they could hide from me. This was annoying but never actually dangerous. I did get one of those beepers that sound an alarm when the child gets a certain distance away from you. But I never found it very useful because my kids are too curious and they'd just take the bracelet off and play with it and lose it and only the parent's side of the device beeped, not the child's side. This seemed very odd to me. I would think the child's side would beep but the manufacturer assumed that the need would be for an alarm showing when the child had left a certain radius, rather than a noise identifying where the child was. I could have attached one of those devices for finding keys to my child's clothing, but I generally didn't find the problem to be big enough to merit extraordinary measures, even with fairly independent kids. Now they roam around our dead-end street the way other kids do, out of sight for even the sharpest-eyed parents. 
• Emergency plans:  I never had to use an emergency plan but I have one. If my husband isn't there and I need to take a child to the emergency room, I can call an ambulance or a taxi. I sometimes worry about the issue of getting a child who is too big for a stroller to the pediatrician's office with a bad flu. It's over a mile to walk to our pediatrician but the issue hasn't come up yet. I generally know how to handle the flu at home, so doctor's visits tend to be either routine check-ups. Some people have asked what I would do if our house caught fire. This is a confusing question to me, because when the electricity goes out at night, I am always the one to say, "Everyone calm down. I'll get the flashlights." Then I walk calmly upstairs in the dark and reach into the box with camping supplies and feel around for the flashlights, just as I would in the day time. Obviously when visibility is low, my ability to get around without seeing much is an advantage. I know my home well and if there was a fire, I would have at least as good of a chance of getting me and the kids out as my husband would. 
• Reading aloud:  Okay, Braille readers have got this one over me. One could even get a Braille copy of the book plus a picture book for kids to look at while you read and you'd have less fights over looking at the pictures than other parents. But I don't read Braille. I read very close and I need significant light. It has taken a long time for me to find the perfect way to handle this. I wanted to lie down with a kid on either side of me, the way my mother did, but I simply couldn't position a lamp close enough so that the book doesn't shadow the print from the light, especially with two little heads poking in from the sides, trying to see the pictures. When I'm reading for myself I'm almost always listening to a text-to-speech program or audiobooks. But small children will listen much better if their parent reads and they need the reading to be much slower and more relaxed than most audiobooks. So, I finally found the perfect way for my particular eyes. I positioned an armchair between the heads of their beds with a lamp right behind the armchair and I sit in the chair while they lie down on either side of me. With a little tilt of the book they can each look at the pictures and over the years they have become a lot more patient about that. 
• Dirty faces and wardrobe:  I have enough vision to coordinate my kids clothing fine. Still, there are some issues. Kids have an incredible ability to mess up their clothes and get dirty faces. It's embarrassing to have someone else point out that your child needs his or her nose blown. I carry handkerchiefs and blow them a lot, but its just bound to happen that my kids occasionally have a spot or some snot on their faces and I don't notice for a few minutes. These things are not life threatening. The same goes for spots on shirts or tags hanging of the back of shirts. If you haven't learned to live with imperfection, kids will teach you. The other people who get it are the real friends. I avoid the people who don't get it. 
• Picking up and dropping off: You'll always hear parents complain about driving their kids to music lessons, dance classes and play dates. Driving. Right. They should try it with a backpack and a marginally functional public transportation system. This is the hardest of the physical issues. I have had to slog through snow drifts with two toddlers and a stroller (which is way harder than it sounds) to get my kids to one social activity per week because the city thought that our sidewalks didn't need to be plowed "because everyone drives anyway." Even in good weather, getting my kids to school and to good enrichment opportunities is hard and that's with having a husband who can drive and do some of it. There is a silver lining to the cloud because my kids are in immeasurably better shape than the norm. At four my son can hike eight miles and he just started soccer where he is expected to run non-stop for an hour and a half with kids nearly twice his age, and he keeps up. 

So much for the easy parts of parenting while legally blind. The hard parts are those having to do with other people.

• Getting play dates: I started out with one friend who had a child my daughter's age. But she lives two-hours away. We did play dates but obviously it wasn't constant and my daughter begged for more. We attended mommy-and-me classes whenever we could but the reception we got was far from cordial. Once I was told by another mother, "You are supposed to look at people you already know and let them know you're glad to see them." We never made one friend in three years of local mommy-and-me classes and never enticed someone to come to our house for a play date. I not only don't do eye contact and visual social cues the way other mothers do, my eyes also look odd and move erratically. Obviously motherhood wasn't the first time I ran into social problems due to these issues, but I found that all the problems I had before becoming a mom were magnified once the people I was trying to befriend were other mothers. My theory is that mothers are protective of their children and instinctively reject anyone they feel is strange. While they might want to be tolerant and open-minded at other times of their lives, motherhood makes many of us feel that prejudices are a "better safe than sorry"safety issue.  The result was that for several years my kids had severe cabin fever and wanted more social activity. Now that they are a bit older and attending preschool, they have started to make their own friends. I still get some weird reactions from their friends' parents, but so far I have been able to turn them around. Mostly all I need is a bit of contact to convince others that I am in fact a good person to be friends with. 
• The reactions of people on the street: There are the people who ask, "How dare you get pregnant and risk passing that on to your kids?" and the people who grab my children at intersections because they are afraid that I won't keep them from getting run over by cars. Both are a test of nerves and quick reflexes. Especially when I had babies in a stroller, it seemed like every time I went to town we had some sort of extremely negative encounter and it added a lot of stress to the regular pressures of mother hood. While this may seem small compared to the physical issues of parenting, I have found that the studies about the adverse health effects of social exclusion have a basis in reality. A person's mind and body can only take so much of this before it takes a significant toll.
• People who shove their view that a blind person is not safe with children in my face: There are very few comments I can imagine which are more stressful for a parent than having someone question your fitness to parent or say (or imply) that you aren't safe for children. This issue came up for me most acutely with extended family, both in general discussions and when a situation arose in which one adult would end up watching several other children and chance had it that the adult was me. I have had my fair share of hard knocks in the social world but I was utterly unprepared for the problems to come from those who were close to me and knew me well. My friends and family know that I have never had to take my kids to the ER. I have pulled a silently drowning child out of a swimming pool on three occasions when I was the fastest to react (the first time when I was twelve years old). I have taught preschool and elementary classes for ten years and I have a clean safety record there as well. So, the first time I was told that I was not capable enough to watch other children because of my vision impairment, it momentary knocked the breath out of me. Quickly my reaction changed to anger and then to icy fear.  Yes, fear. For a very simple reason. If, heaven forbid, there ever is an accident while I am watching children, I had been put on notice that I would be blamed specifically. Accidents do happen with children, even when adults are vigilant. But I can't afford to have a child that isn't mine fall and scrape a knee, because it is very possible that others will not shrug and say, "Well, that's part of being a kid," as they might if the babysitter were someone else. Instead there would be specific blame. The result has been that although I am very open to watching other people's children to give my kids more fun, I have to be very cautious about it, because of the prejudices around the issue of my vision impairment. 

It's never a good idea to end on a very negative note, so I'd like to offer a couple of unexpected advantages to parenting while legally blind as well.

• Mama really does have eyes in the back of her head: My kids still can't figure out how I know exactly what they were touching in the other room. I think the whole thing about mothers having eyes in the back of their head is just sighted mothers developing some of the attention to sound that most blind people develop. I can tell very specifically what my kids are doing in the other room, what toy they're playing with and what they're doing with it. I can often multitask and "watch" kids from the other room more effectively than sighted parents because I don't have to be looking to tell what's going on. 
• Lower gross-factor parenting: Kids sometimes do gross things that I'm glad I can't see. My children are not always well-behaved and my daughter has been known to chew up her food and then open her mouth to display it in order to try to annoy adults. She also does a lot of sticking out her tongue and "giving the evil eye" when she's angry (according to my sighted friends). I can now even tell when she is doing these things and I am just as glad to have one less thing to push my buttons. When I was changing diapers the same thing applied. While sighted people ask how I can wipe off gross things without seeing them, I have a hard time understanding why you would want to see them. Just wipe the whole thing several times carefully, so as not to get anything gross onto other objects and have done with it. I can tell if there is something to wipe even through the rag. There is no need to examine the mess too closely.
• Mommy fashions: Fashion is not a hobby of mine. I dress cleanly and presentably and that's the end of it. Sometimes I'll wear a wild scarf or skirt for fun, but I don't want to be in the mommy-glamour contest on at the playground. I know it is going on but I find that I am just as happy to miss out on the whole thing. 

So, what are your parenting challenges? Anything to add or gripe about?  Every parent I know feels a bit over their head. Here's a chance to share. Add your comments below. I always love your comments on these posts.

This is harder than it looks: What are the real ball-breaker challenges of being blind or visually impaired

When you're watching a blind person, you may think that not tripping is difficult or not running into things. However, those things are not usually that difficult for a blind person. I'm currently writing a blind character into one of my books and finding the experience of describing in detail the experiences of what is difficult and what is actually not that big of a deal to be enlightening even to me. 

Creative Commons image by Angus of Flickr.com

I would like to open up this topic because blind and visually impaired people are often grabbed and pulled or dragged someplace in public places and it can be a bit dangerous (not to mention that it is unnecessary, rude and unpleasant). On the other hand there are some things that are indeed very difficult for visually impaired and blind people and I never see these things mentioned in society as things that people should be aware of.

I don't mean any of this as criticism of sighted people. There are good reasons why sighted people don't always understand how living long-term with a vision impairment or blindness is very different from wearing a blindfold. My goal is simply to give some helpful information that will save you a lot of confusion when interacting with blind people. 

Here are some of the things that are classically difficult specifically for visually impaired people: 

• Pretending to make eye contact: Many blind and visually impaired people take lessons to be able to fake eye contact. It can be done, but it is always a difficult task. If a legally blind person looks at your eyes it is because they have made a conscious choice to expend energy to make you feel comfortable. Blind people try to fake eye contact in order to gain social acceptance, but the irony is that those of us who are moderately successful at it are sometimes accused of faking our blindness or people forget that we can't recognize them.

How you can help visually impaired friends: Recognize that making eye contact is difficult. Don't criticize those who haven't mastered it or belittle the difficulties of those who have. It is like saying please and thank you in a foreign language when you're travelling... except even harder. It is a courtesy we try to learn in order to be polite to sighted people and it takes effort for us.

• Recognizing friends: There are many people who I have known for years whose names I do not know. Some of them would probably be deeply hurt to discover that I don't recognize them in person. I have heard sighted people say many times that I "should be able to recognize voices." First, recognizing voices is more difficult than most sighted people think, especially to those of us without much musical talent. Second, I often recognize a person's voice after several meetings, but the person doesn't then reintroduce themself at the time when I have learned to recognize their voice, so they continue to be nameless until I can match up their voice to someone I know on email or Facebook through some good old detective work.

How you can help visually impaired friends: While it is usually a good idea to ask before you help a person with any kind of disability, this is one accommodation I recommend friends make even before they ask. It can be very socially awkward for a blind person to ask and I have been rebuffed rudely often when I did ask for someone's name again, so many blind people will simply remain silent and confused about who they are talking to. Please say, "Hi Arie, it's..." and add your name, when you meet a visually impaired friend named Arie. If you live with the visually impaired person in one house or apartment they probably do recognize your voice, but beyond that their ability to recognize you will vary widely. Some newly blind people can't recognize anyone and really struggle. If you are worried that you are being patronizing by introducing yourself ask, "Do you want me to tell you who I am?" rather than as some of my acquaintances have demanded at times, "Do you even know who I am?" Don't be offended if your close friend doesn't recognize your voice. Some voices are easier than others to recognize and this really has nothing to do with how dearly your friend holds you. If your blind friend says, "Oh, you don't have to tell me that," or something similar, then it's okay to stop introducing yourself.

Creative Commons image by European Board of Students

• Hearing people introduce themselves in a group and then being able to recognize them later: I dread conferences, workshops, summer camps, parent meetings at my kids' preschool and professional meetings. Either there is a quick round of names once (often at the beginning of a whole series of meetings) or there are name tags. Either way, everyone else is operating in a known environment and I am utterly lost.  If it is difficult to recognize the voices of friends, it's impossible to recognize voices in a group based on one quick introduction. I have worked in an office for months where everyone knew everyone's name except me. Because everyone was solidly introduced int he beginning, it was assumed that everyone knew everyone else's name and coworkers were clearly offended if I admitted that I couldn't recognize them. So, after a few mortifying experiences, I spent weeks carefully stepping around the issue of names until I could recognize people by their voices, offices and roles. Then I spent more weeks conducting my own private investigations to figure out who belonged to which name.

How to help visually impaired friends: First and foremost, please reintroduce yourself if you are in a group situation with a blind person. Not every time you turn around perhaps, but if you come to ask the blind colleague a question or discuss a specific issue. If your friend is blind or visually impaired and you work together or attend an event together, ask if you can help by whispering who is who for the first couple of days. Offer this as a volunteer if you see a blind person in a conference or workshop you attend. I can't emphasize enough what an incredible gift this would be to give someone, even if it was only occasional help. The fact that you may not know everyone's name either isn't important.

• Not being startled: This is not such a big one for me personally because I'm not totally blind and I very rarely fail to hear someone nearby. But I have heard many blind people say that they are often unpleasantly startled by someone touching them or speaking close to their ear all of the sudden. I am not sure where the impulse comes from but I have observed that well-meaning people will often approach a blind person to ask if they can help and first they will reach out to lay a gentle hand on the person's arm, possibly in an instinctual hope that this will announce their presence better than using their voice. Unfortunately, this impulse is wrong. Blind people are used to integrating surprising new sounds and will have a much easier and more pleasant experience if you speak first and refrain from touching them at all.

How you can help blind friends: Don't touch a blind person without asking. Particularly never grab a blind person from behind and push him or her where you think they want or need to go. This can be very disorienting and dangerous as well as rude and unpleasant for the person involved. Especially near traffic or trains it is important not to interrupt a blind person's orientation. Instead, if you approach a blind person speak normally and let them know who you are. Avoid shouting and if you are concerned that your voice may startle them, you can always cough or rustle your clothing.

• Finding objects someone else touched and put back in the same place... well, only six inches away: If you live or work with a blind or visually impaired person, it is important to agree on a system of organization. It is extremely difficult for a visually impaired person to find objects that another person moves and you would be utterly shocked at how little movement it takes. Visually impaired and blind people develop spacial memory that would surprise most sighted people. I know where hundreds of objects are very specifically located in my house. I regularly spend 30 minutes out of a busy day searching for something as simple as a basic cooking ingredient or the can opener because my husband moved it. After 15 years of marriage one might think he'd be used to it but he still "puts things back" only in the general vicinity of where they are supposed to be. Let's not even talk about how difficult it is when someone didn't put the matches, scissors, salt, etc back at all.

How you can help blind family members, roommates and coworkers: Discuss and agree on where common objects belong and then put them back exactly where they go. If the blind person has their own items rather than sharing them, which is common, ask before borrowing them and return them in person so that the blind person can put them back themselves. If you are giving a document or important object to a blind family member or colleague, specifically say, "Here is the .... for you," and put it in their hands. I can't count the times my husband and I have lost important small documents or flash drives and then he protested, "But I put it on the table right in front of you on Sunday night!"

• Shopping: I hate shopping off-line. I know visually impaired and blind people who say they love it. I suspect them of being a little masochistic, but maybe they just have secrets I haven't learned yet. That wall of items with flashy prices and endless packaging is daunting at the best of times. I have to bring any object I want to see up to be two inches from my face and this makes the process of searching for cooking, craft and school supplies very slow and tedious.

How you can help blind friends: Recommend good online stories or help a friend without great technical skills to set up an account and shop online. Help setting up online shopping accounts (and the text-to-speech programs to use them) would be a great gift for older people who are newly visually impaired.)

• Participating in a conversation with more than one other person: This is a surprising issue. In fact, for many years I didn't realize that conversation in a group is easier for sighted people. I only knew that I am much more able to express myself in a one-on-one conversation and that I often got in trouble for interrupting when I had no intention to do so. There are a lot of communication cues that are visual. Supposedly 90 percent of communication is visual, according to scientists. And it seems visual communication is particularly important in groups. When I'm in a conversation with more than two other people, I often feel somewhat out of phase. I either dominate the conversation by having a set leadership role or I can't get a word in at all. There is no middle ground. Whenever I hear a pause and start to speak, I find that I'm speaking over someone else without meaning to.

How you can help blind friends: This is a tough one because I don't know enough about how the visual communication among sighted people works. Perhaps the most important thing you can do is to be aware of this issue and take into consideration that your blind friend who is very quiet probably isn't actually nearly as quiet as he or she seems. Many blind people will avoid interrupting others to the point that they rarely participate at all in group conversations. It's possible that simply being aware of this will change your subconscious communication signals so that others in a group give a blind person more opportunity to participate without anxiety as well.)

• Making friends in a new place: How do people make friends in a new school, town or workplace? Well, often they are part of a class or work with others, but that doesn't make a friendship. It's when they make eye contact and smile that a real conversation starts. Without the visual cues, most of these friendships just never start.

Eleven years ago my husband and I moved to a new town. It was one of many new places for me and I was excited about the opportunities to make new friends. But within a few months I saw the same old pattern repeat itself. I would make a good connection with someone at the community center or at my child's toddler class and almost think we were going to be friends. But then after a few days or weeks the relationship would go sour and the acquaintance would stop saying hello to me.

Finally, after I had been in town a few years, I was in a group of women at the local community center and the topic of moving to a new place and making friends came up. One of the other mentioned that she "knew" I was very private and aloof and didn't really want to be friends with people. Nothing was further from the truth and I said so. The woman explained that when women come into the community center they make eye contact and smile at those who they have met before. And I didn't do that.

I understood then some of what had been going on with my many false starts in new places. I don't do the interplay of visual signals well, and yet I don't look blind because my mobility skills are so good, that people easily forget. The women still did not understand that day, even though I was holding a white cane.

How you can help blind friends, neighbors and coworkers:  If you are already friends with a blind person, you can help by pointing out who is who in community situations. If you have a blind neighbor or coworker who you don't know, try to overcome your natural and well-intentioned blocks when it comes to visual communication. You may have the feeling that a blind person is aloof but this is rarely the case. It is simply an instinctive response sighted people have to the way blind people look. Strike up a conversation, reintroduce yourself when you meet again and be aware that some blind people are very socially isolated and may almost be confused by your friendliness in the beginning.

• Having someone show you how to do something, especially on a computer screen: It is almost impossible for a sighted person to describe each step of a physical task or operation on a computer with words. Very often someone helpful sits down to "show" me how to do something, when they know full well that I can't see the screen. Still they say they will tell me the steps, but they don't say everything. It is nearly impossible for a sighted person to remember to say ever movement. The only way to "show" me how to do something is to have me do it and to verbally guide me through it. I'm one of the least blind of the legally blind and there is no way in the world I can look over someone's shoulder and see a computer screen.

How you can help blind friends: If you want to show a blind person how to do a task, whether it's a physical task or a computer issue, give them the tools or the keyboard and tell them the steps that need to be done as they do them. If they go wrong correct them. This may seem slow and cumbersome at first but it will actually go much faster than the alternative.

• Getting a ride / surviving in the United States with almost no public transportation: One of the biggest issues for visually impaired people is transportation. I am often told by sighted friends that I should just get a ride to the places I want to go. And yet even before I had children I could almost never get a ride with friends. My family members drove me most places or I simply didn't go. Now that I have children getting a ride for me and two kids with car seats is seriously impossible. That is one reason that I now live in Central Europe now where we have good trains and buses. I also have a husband who can drive, which helps with the logistics. But I still meet many visually impaired people who have no transportation and when I visit the US I am immediately without the ability to run basic errands or visit friends. 

How you can help blind friends and family members: Primarily remember that this is a big issue. If you feel like you wish you could help so and so who is blind and you haven't given them a ride this week... well, it's kind of obvious. Figure out when you are going toward the store or other places they need to go. If they work or study in the direction where you are going, ask if it would be helpful. Even if you aren't going to the exact same place, perhaps you are going someplace where they can get public transit. Blind people are used to constantly calculating transportation routes, so just mention any options you have and they'll be able to figure it out. 

Creative Commons image by Braille Institute

If you look back at this list, you will see that everything here has to do with either social interaction or dealing with modern society. While I am sure that there are physical challengers for blind and visually impaired people in more natural environments, I don't find them to be as critical in the long term. People who are newly visually impaired often struggle with orientation, getting around and physical tasks like cooking and gardening. But these things can be learned and overcome by the individual. Guide dogs can be of immeasurable help to some in the physical arena. But it is in the social world that blindness becomes a true disability. 

That's why I've included notes on how you can help blind friends, neighbors, coworkers, family members and roommates. Many sighted people have an instinctual fear of losing their vision and believe that being blind would be a terrible fate. Physically I don't think it is nearly as terrible as many would make it out to be. But it is a significant disability today, primarily because of the social implications. And social simply means "among people." That means that is where the difficulties are but also where the solutions lie. 

On a lighter note there are quite a few things that are relatively easy for blind people to do that might surprise a lot of sighted people, such as:

1. Washing dishes
2. Cooking (as long as no one moves any tools or spices)
3. Riding a bike/horse
4. Cutting things with sharp implements
5. Sewing
6. Computer work
7. Fixing things with your hands
8. Most sports
9. Backpacking in the wilderness
10. Reading how someone else is feeling
11. Telling when someone is lying (faces lie more than voices)
12. Organizational stuff and giving detailed directions or instructions. If you really want good directions, ask a blind person who knows the way.
13. Remembering a zillion things--where I put things, how many steps up to the office, how many steps before you turn into Joe's office, where all my files are, etc.
14. Parenting (Okay, not easy but it's never easy. It's the hardest thing I've ever done and a lot of sighted people agree. But it is very possible for blind people to do.)
15. Travelling internationally

What are your experiences? I love your comments on these posts. Ask questions, share your experiences and discuss the issues below.

Of apathy and corn sex

I'm out at dusk every night these days, winding my way through the corn stalks, a small pile of golden dust and husks in my palm. I find the luscious, moist bunches of silk, open to the sky and waiting--smelling of sex and life. And I sprinkle the gold between the glistening strands.

Corn silk - Creative Commons image by Heather Kaiser

I am the handmaiden of corn sex. 

Despite the connotations, it is actually disappointingly non-erotic. I do this because my sweet corn patch is to small to rely on wind-born pollination alone. I do it because I believe childhood without sweetcorn is a crime and you can't buy it in the Czech Republic. I do it because I want my kids to grow old and watch their grandchildren playing in the shade of a tree. I want there to be children in a seventy or eighty years... and trees. 

The result of corn sex, whether facilitated by me or by the wind, are little bulges of bright yellow flesh, sweet and heady. They can be left to harden into the seeds of new life, brewed into intoxicating alcohol, ground into flour to sustain life or slurped fresh from the cob in ecstasy. Without corn sex, the cobs come out thin and pale, bare or with just a few lonely kernels to show what might have been.

Those anemic cobs remind me of so many faces I meet in the street, online or in my school room where I teach English as a second language to work-weary adults and school-weary teenagers. Sallow and lost, robbed of the golden bulges of life. And I wonder if that answers some of the questions that keep plopping down in my path these past few weeks.

Corn silk - Creative commons image by Mary Hutchison

Human beings are missing something? Certainly we're crowded enough for pollination, but the right wind hasn't been blowing.

What can awaken the passion and life in these faces? Even the desire for survival?

Is it that we need more sex?

Pop culture certainly seems to hint that people crave sex. As soon as I dove into the book selling game I encountered an uncomfortable truth. Nothing sells like erotica. I'm not just talking about all the authors who wish they had written Fifty Shades of Gray. One author told me, "I have three different pen names. One of them publishes erotica and it's so much easier to sell. There's no comparison. With anything else you have write technicaly perfect, emotionally gripping, truly life-changing stories and even then you might be buried. With erotica, you can have all the typos you want and plot holes as big as the Grand Canyon and it still sells reasonably well." 

My friends laugh and tell me my career path is clear. Corn sex and word sex. 

But people keep reading the stuff with sex, whether it's erotica or teenage romances with love triangles and sexual tension. And the readers remain pale and flaccid themselves. The sex isn't helping. Possibly it is even draining more of their life force. 

That's what sex is after all. Life force. Something happens between the pollen and the kernel, something called "life" that science has not yet been able to entirely explain. Each kernel has the potential to become a whole new plant, a new life. The bursting, juicy, musky bulges are the expression of passion.

And it's passion that I find is missing in so many faces. My students come fresh from summer break, their heads down and feet dragging.

Creative commons image by Alan Levine

"What do you want to do?" I ask.

"I don't know," they mumble.

"Let's just talk awhile," I suggest. "What did you do over the summer?"

"Nothing." 

I don't give up. I press them for details and the answer finally comes.

"We went to the beach in Italy. Good ice cream. Okay pizza. Otherwise boring. "

I am momentarily stunned. If this gets no enthusiasm, what hope is there for these kids?

"What would you rather be doing instead of English class?" I ask.

"Video games," most answer.

"Which computer game would you play?" 

"I don't know." 

That's how it goes day after day. I am charged to get them talking in English and make sure their grades stay up. It's how I keep clothes on my own children. But my goal is really to find some spark of passion in these kids. Anything they care about. A passion can always be nurtured and grown, brought into the lesson, made relevant. Even if it's video games.

Corn tassels - Creative commons image by Nic McPhee

And these are the children, the ones who should be full of energy and new life. It's even worse with adults. After I wrote about our family struggles in combating climate change, the response was remarkable... in a depressing sort of way. The most common responses mirrored this:

"We're all trying but it's hopeless. The damage has already been done. Our children are doomed." 

or even this:

"We have to keep going, keep working for a better world. I'll take out the recycling today. At least I do my bit."

But most were silent. No one in my vicinity actually doubts climate change is a huge threat or that it is caused by our actions. But there are plenty who are so sapped of life force that they have forcefully put it out of their minds.

In one political and intellectual forum which is usually a hot place for environmental and social justice discussions, the most "liked" comment on my article about climate change was this: "Meh, and if we all stopped enjoying life, staying home with the lights off, think how much energy we might save. But I'll pass, OK?"

Other people commenting on the article approved of this comment more than anything else. (Oh, the wonders of modern opinion polling.) These aren't climate change deniers but those who otherwise are essentially on the same side. They talk about the horrible facts and bemoan the lack of political and corporate action. But when it comes to their own passion and life force, there's, "Meh."  

Creative commons image by Tamara of Flickr.com

And I know this for a fact, whether I'm striving for a future for my child or fighting climate change or even just growing corn, life force is crucial. Without the passion there are no golden bulges. Results remain pale and wan. 

And this is where my post diverges from your standard inspirational fair. At this point I am supposed to say, "So, find your passion. Go out and make something of your life. Live the ordinary life in an extraordinary way." And so forth. 

But I'm not going to. Because I don't think passion or life force is something we manufacture at will. We can force ourselves to do hard work, even when we don't have the energy. But the drive to push past exhaustion? That comes from life force. Without passion such a message is nothing but a guilt trip.

Instead of forcing or manufacturing passion. I simply want to ask the question. Where does life force come from? Where do we get it? 

I have seen it blossom where there is need. The needs of one's children, the need for food and shelter. Those things spur people to heroic levels of action, coming from life force far beyond what you'd expect from the tired worn-out face. But many people have great passion without urgent need and many of those who do have great need fail most miserably to summon it. So need cannot be the primary key.

Creative commons image by hthrd of flickr.com

There have been years of my life when I felt little passion beyond sadness and frustration. Some of that was true depression, based on difficult circumstances and a harsh social environment. But also based on my own lack of life force. And yet that time of inaction today feels oddly like a well of deep cool water, something I draw on for passionate writing or loving or ecstatic gardening.

Is depression always the enemy? Are we all born with the same level of life force? Can one really go out and find passion? 

What I have seen for myself is that life force is built over time. It is funded like a reservoir of water deep under the ground. And just like a land in drought, that aquifer can nourish life long after the rains have dried up in great need. But by the same token it can be exhausted.

What fills the reservoir? It may be different for each person but things that feed the soul will most likely help. Rest and time to heal, contact with nature, children and elders, animal and plant companions, kindness from another, the acceptance of a friend or even a stranger, creative expression and authentic hope. These things have the potential to ill the reservoir if there is enough time to wait.

Time is not in great supply these days and the life force reservoir of humanity is running at drought levels. May I learn to withhold judgment. 

Do you have any personal ideas about the questions in this post? Where do you find passion? Have you ever felt that times of depression had a use? What can we do to replenish our life force, so we can do things that matter?

How leaders prevent social exclusion: Raw experience and practical tips

I'm sitting on the hard bench of a cafeteria table on the ground floor of my elementary school where the cafeteria is. There's a pock-marked wall. Dark green.

Weird details stand out. I have a vague impression of plastic trays, the light from the kitchen and the voice of my second-grade teacher who has pigs at home that eat our leftovers... And the big table where I sit alone. 

There are several tables in the lunch room. All of them packed. Except mine. 

I was seven or eight, nine or ten that day. Hard to say. It went on for years.

The memory of pain is distant. I have to focus to perceive that my chest feels tight, my heartbeat has sped up, there's a loud ringing in my ears that drowns out present reality and my nose stings as if I've just snorted up chlorinated pool water. The mental image of that cafeteria automatically sends my body into overdrive--ready to fight for survival. If I'm with someone else when this memory surfaces, chances are that I'll suddenly find myself screaming, crying and/or fighting with them--having blacked out for a moment, unable to understand how I ended up acting like this. 

Classic trauma response, as if I was a vet with PTSD.

Creative Commons image by Martinak15 of Flickr.com

But there wasn't even very much violence involved. I was only beaten up a handful of times on a playground as a kid (that I remember). 

So, what are the PTSD symptoms from? 

A few years ago an adult friend told me she'd visited my old elementary school before it was torn down. She said she was shocked to hear kids daring each other to touch the diseased "Arie hole" in the wall of the cafeteria. She described the pock-marked wall I remember exactly. This new generation of kids had hear of my mythical cooties.

And I'd left that elementary school fifteen years earlier. 

Because I don't remember much of those years, I have only the facts I have been told by witnesses to go on in trying to trace my traumatic responses to their source:

• I had no friends at school. None. Even though I tried to be friendly. I shared things freely. I was never intentionally mean or unsocial..
• I made deals with my friends from outside school to pretend we didn’t know each other in school in order to protect them from being ostracized by association.
• I wasn't just picked last. I was never allowed to join in games at recess. 
• I sat alone at lunch every day, even though other tables were crowded..
• I cried and argued when I was rejected. I was not the quiet suffering type.
• I often sat in the classroom during recess, because I was no more popular with the teachers and I was always in trouble.
• I asked too many questions in class and interrupted to ask if I could get out of my seat to try to see the blackboard closer. I annoyed and frustrated teachers.
• Kids my age never came to my birthday parties. Except when I was seven my mother made a great effort to make sure other girls came to my birthday party. She cajoled other parents into it. I remember the pretty napkins and party favors, the outdoor fairy tea party table we set up. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity and even so I was largely left out while the others played. But at least I remember that day, unlike most of the others, which are blank holes.

Those are the things I’ve been told. In essence I was shunned. That may even be all, nothing worse than that,. It doesn’t sound that extreme when written down that way. It sounds like I should have just been more sociable and everything would have been fine. At least that’s what people would like to think.

Creative Commons image by  CileSuns92 of Flickr.com

Why was I isolated in elementary school? Does the specific reason matter? There is often a kid like this--if not in every classroom than at least in almost every school. I've seen them. The ones no one will touch. Sometimes teachers try to help them and some times teachers dislike them as much as the kids do. They're chosen last again and again or not chosen at all if that's an option. They always have to partner with the teacher on projects and sometimes even the teacher resents it. These kids have disabilities or they're overweight  or they are visibly different in some other way or their parent's are poor or they're foster kids or they come to school dirty and hungry or they're just "a bit odd."  

It seems like every time I hear a discussion about bullying and social exclusion these days the whole thing gets bogged down in, "Yes, everyone is bullied at school. These mean girls called me..." 

I'm sorry to draw a line, but no, that isn't actually the same thing. Being teased or beaten up or harassed by some mean kids occasionally is not the same. It isn't okay either. It hurts and kids should be protected from that sort of thing. But it isn't the kind of bullying that we need to be talking about most. The kind that causes PTSD-like symptoms. This is social exclusion and it's a kind of bullying that 90 percent of the population, both children and adults, perpetrate--often without realizing it.

Social isolation - social exclusion

Unlike the inspiring stories on Facebook about a kid who is bullied and then the whole town comes out to support him, those who suffer from social isolation are almost entirely voiceless. They don't have a fan club. They aren't good looking or inspiring. They are the ones who make you uncomfortable, so you move across the room at a party without even consciously registering that you’re doing it.

And adults do it as much, if not more than kids. In fact it's becoming a hot-button topic in leadership training and all types of organizations interested in social cohesion and productive group dynamics.

Here's a real-life example of how social exclusion happens among adults.

I recently attended a week-long retreat in the mountains. It was my second year at the retreat but most of the people had been there longer, for as long as eight years. Most of them had formed strong friendships over the years. The group is interested in being mutually supportive for people with a particular family issue to deal with. The first year I attended I had high hopes for finding some friends.

By the second year, I knew not to expect much. But I went because there were things there that my kids needed.

I'm not a small child anymore and I know that the people at the retreat didn't mean to be cruel or even intentionally exclude me. And yet it happened. Again.

The first day, I made a huge effort to remember people's names. I wrote down and memorized the name every time I met someone new. But most people had been there the year before so they didn’t introduce themselves. They just called out greetings in a swirl around me. I may have heard everyone’s name once in a circle, but I couldn’t see the faces as the introductions were happening. I can’t see faces further away than four inches and they were sitting across the room.

I’m legally blind. And because I couldn’t see faces when I was an infant either, I never acquired the neurological hardwiring that allows people to easily remember the nuances of faces, so even photographs are only marginally useful. I don't have a problem remembering names, like a lot of people with that legitimate problem. I have a problem registering faces.

I know it seems like people would be understanding about the fact that a blind person doesn't recognize people's faces. But they usually aren't. I have been shocked time and again when people act offended at my assertion that I simply can't recognize them, while I'm holding a white cane. I've had people say openly, "That's no excuse. Don't you recognize voices?" or "You just don't care to try hard enough."  

Well, yes, after several longer conversations when I know who the person speaking is, I do eventually recognize voices. But when I'm in a group introduction situation, I only have that one brief sentence of introduction that is connected to the name. After that, it's just a jumble. There is no way I can connect a particular voice back to that name that was mentioned once at a distance.

So, by the second day of the retreat I had a list of names. And I had a few people who I could recognize by their voices. But I still had no idea which name belonged to which voice. And most voices were still a jumble because the others rarely conversed with me.

So, let me get down to why a little. My eyes look strange and that's off-putting. Subconsciously. They're squinty and the move strangely. I also can't do those basic social things like smile at a person in a group to show that I recognize them or use another person’s name and make eye contact when I say hello after all. Sometimes I don’t even acknowledge a friend's presence with a polite hello.

As so many times before, my fellows at the retreat soon thought of me as aloof and somewhat antisocial. They began to ignore me. Those few particularly thoughtful souls who initially made the effort to greet everyone they saw in the morning or at meal times stopped saying hello to me.  

Is this hard to believe? I’ve tried to explain it before and friends often shake their heads and say that surely people are not so quick to judge. But I’ve seen it happen over and over again and again, every time I join a new group. My friends ask me why I don’t just tell others that I can’t see them and can’t recognize them. And yes, I do that sometimes. I used to do it more. But it almost always backfires and creates even more severe social problems. People don't understand why I am telling them this when we first meet.

And it isn't primarily a conscious judgment people make. For adults, it is a function of the business of life and the fact that social situations are chaotic. They simply prioritize those they connect with more easily. And then when there is a connection with me and I then say I don't know their name, they are a bit offended.

I would bet you don’t think you would be offended by a person with a white cane if they asked for your name after several days of intense conversations. And maybe you are the exception.. But I have seen it happen more times than I care to count. When I come to the point when I can actually recognize a person's voice after either several days of close-quarters contact at an event or several months of occasional contact among neighbors, I have asked for a reintroduction with a name and people go cold with shock. They have known me for a long time, by their reckoning, and the idea that I was "faking" that I knew them all this time is very disconcerting. They feel betrayed and used.  The budding friendship ends. So, I have learned to keep my mouth shut and hope for a clear mention of their name by someone else in a situation where i can tell who is who just from listening. 

At this retreat, I vowed that I would do things right. I wrote down names and notes about people. I forced myself to focus on pretending to make eye contact by looking joyfully into the blurry dark spots where people’s eyes usually are. I greeted guests at the mountain lodge brightly and ended up with several quizzical responses from people who were not part of our group. But it wasn’t enough. Plenty of times I felt someone brush past me when I had not been quick enough to greet them in the hallway. By the second day, none of our group said “hello“ or “good morning“ to me anymore.

I could hear conversation going on all around me at meal times, but I was outside of it. When I tried to participate the effect was awkward and I often ended up interrupting people anyway because I couldn’t see them taking a breath or see the the focused look in their eyes that people know means someone is about to speak.

On the fourth day, I was sitting next to two other women at the outdoor fire, listening as one questioned the other on a point about a new law that would affect our group. Interested, I leaned into the conversation and asked a question of my own. The woman who had been holding forth turned on me and demanded “What?” with irritation in her voice. It was clear that she had considered their conversation to be private, even though we were sitting close together.

I was gradually falling out of the group. I’ve seen it happen time and again as an adult. Everyone else knew everyone else's name. This was a group that prides itself on being inclusive and friendly. They all greeted each other on the garden walkways outside or in the common room both with words and eyes. They noticed that I didn’t do these things, but they didn’t make the connection to the fact that I couldn’t see them, partly because I walk and hold myself like sighted people do. I have learned mobility well, in some ways too well.

Toward the end of the week-long retreat, I was having a particularly difficult morning. I felt isolated. No one had spoken to me the day before. And that morning the group  activities were impossible for me to participate in. One involved remembering some words the presenter wrote on a flip chart at the front of the room. Except the presenter didn't mention that there were words on a flip chart because everyone could see them and we were half-way through the activity before I realized what I was missing. By the time I went up to the chart and copied down the words the activity was over. 

The next activity was a dance workshop. It was supposed to make us feel good, creative and free, while we learned specific dance steps. Everyone was up in the middle of the circle. The music was lively. Most people had seen these dance steps at previous retreats. I remembered the painful dance workshop from the year before too. I like to dance and would have loved to know the steps, but the presenter simply demonstrated the steps in the middle of the group without words or description. She emphasized the steps once for the group slowly and then moved faster.

Even the slow demonstration was a blur to me. I had made sure I was standing near the presenter but I still couldn’t see her feet beyond the blur. I could hear the rhythm and I tried to guess. If the presenter had gone slowly three or four times and described the steps, I could have done the rest by listening to the rhythm. But there wasn't time. Many of the participants were kids and they had to keep things hopping. Most people already knew those dances from previous years anyway. I was the only odd one out.

So, I didn't ask for help. It would have disrupted the whole group. And that was why my nerves were raw as I came into the cafeteria of the retreat area for lunch with my four-year-old son.

I approached two places at one of the tables that seemed to be free. “We’re sitting there,” a woman’s voice came from behind me as I pulled the chair out. I looked around. There were clearly no other places left inside the cafeteria, maybe one alone in a corner but not two for me and my son.

A few people always had to sit outside in the direct sun with swarms of wasps at every meal, because the cafeteria is too small. That was hard on me. The bright light is very uncomfortable for my eyes and I can’t see the wasps, so the chances are very high that I’ll be stung, particularly on my mouth or tongue, while eating.

Trying to sit inside, I had been asked to move at every meal. Each time the reason was something like, “We want to sit here with our friends,” or “We’ve been sitting here all week. This is our table.” By this time late in the retreat, all the places inside had become someone’s “regular spot.” And I was in no regular group of friends. I had no regular place. As usual, I was being pushed out.

And it was a cafeteria again. Is there anything more hardwired in our DNA when it comes to social exclusion. There literally was no place at the table for me. I noticed that someone had in fact reserved these places with spoons, in order to go get the food.

"Fine. You all have your places and your friends. There's no place for us." I turned and snapped at the woman. She carried an infant in her arms and clearly didn't want to sit outside either. 

The room went dark around me. The roaring in my ears blocked out sound. The cascade of trauma response had started and I couldn’t think straight. My heart was hammering and I was filled with seething fear, anger, shame and grief, beyond anything that is bearable. Certainly beyond any normal response to being asked to honor a seat reservation. 

I whirled away then and tried to run out of the room. Some small voice of reason at the back of my mind was urging me to get away, not to have an emotional meltdown in front of people I wanted to befriend. But I couldn’t get through the crowd. The tenuous hold I had on my emotions slipped and I was crying, sobbing in front of everyone.

The woman who had sparked my reaction was shocked. She had simply been asking for the place that she had reserved and she had an allergy to wasp stings that could put her in the hospital if she sat outside. Others clamored around me, disapproving of my outburst and interpreting it as simple willful desire for that chair.

“What is such a big deal? Just go sit outside.”

“For heaven’s sake, you’ll get to eat too. You don’t need to force your way into everything."

"You're a bit overweight anyway.”

“You could try thinking of someone else for a change.”

I could only cry harder. How could I explain? They were already convinced that I was aloof. I didn’t know their names and they all knew mine and each other’s. This was so much bigger than not wanting to sit out with the wasps that I couldn’t see.

How can organizers foster inclusion in a group?

That sort of social disaster is usually where this sort of episode in my life ends. People feel that I have acted badly, selfishly and with too much emotion. I apologize profusely and flee. If I have to continue to be around that group for some reason, the relationship is strained and cold. Otherwise, I never see those people again. And the next time I try to make friends the same thing happens. No matter how hard I try to make it come out differently.

But this wasn’t the average situation. The organizers of the group had a deep interest in social inclusion. They didn’t notice the warning signs of social exclusion in the group, but once the meltdown happened they stepped up to the challenge. We worked out a plan together for how to prevent these sorts of problems, not just for me but for others as well. 

And the very first bit of the plan implemented on the last day of this retreat had immediate and tangible results. The group was asked to break up into groups for a project. I dread such scenarios because the groups are always formed by preexisting friendships. I end up either the odd person out or in a group of those who are lackadaisical or disinterested in the project (those being the reasons why they didn’t manage to get a place in a “real” group).

But this time the organizers tried my first suggestion for fostering social inclusion, and the effect was that all the groups--not just the one I was in--were extraordinarily successful in their projects. The cooperation in my group was vibrant and one of the members of the group who had seemed most irritated with me led the group and included me fully.

Creative Commons image by Grupo Emaús F.S

Working with groups of children might be a bit different, but this time I'm going to focus on tips for teachers of adults, event organizers, teen camp counselors, social groups, working groups, professional teams and activist organizations who want to truly ensure that no one is excluded. Ensuring inclusion in a group, not only is the right thing to do and avoids social unpleasantness, it also clearly boosts the work of any group and ensures that teams reach their goals more effectively. 

 For now, I suggest five areas of focus for group leaders and event organizers: 

• the language of inclusion,
• access to information and spaces,
• introductions,
• relationships and
• effort

Within those topics here are specific tips and ideas:

Creative Commons image by HA1-000974 of Flickr.com

1. One of the easiest and most concrete ways to ensure inclusion is to moderate the forming of sub-groups. When something requires the large group to split up into smaller groups either A. split up the group randomly by counting people off, B. assign groups based on the known strengths and weaknesses of participants in order to ensure all groups will have the skill sets needed to succeed or C. ask group participants to consciously attempt to join a group with those they have not worked with before or don’t know well. (Each of these methods has its advantages and disadvantages depending on the size and type of group you’re working with, but if employed well they will vastly improve group dynamics.)
2. Include the “language of inclusivity” in promotional and organizational messages for your group. When you write an email to remind participants what to bring or similar details, don’t consider it corny to mention your hope that everyone will be included. Ask participants to be conscious that some people will know each other and others won’t know anyone in the group. Ask them to reach out to those who are new as one of the ways to support the goals of the group (even if and possibly especially if those goals are simply to have fun).
3. When you make introductory remarks in front of the group, emphasize inclusion and the need for participants to help one another with details and include those who tend to be on the margins. State your intentions and make social inclusion an open goal of the group. It will support all other goals, including professional and technical objectives.
4. When you print out schedules or programs include a note on them about who to ask if you need assistance due to a disability or language difficulty as well as an upbeat note asking participants to lend a hand when they see someone who is lost or having difficulty. These notes may seem like pro forma political correctness (and they can be just that if organizers don't follow through with other measures), but wide experience of professionals in social work and psychology shows that the goals and intentions we state do have an impact. Not everyone will heed your reminders, but some will and that will often be enough to ensure that your participants aren’t excluded and your goals are reached more effectively.
5. Try to ensure that there is enough space/chairs/tables/materials for everyone registered for your event or meeting. It may seem like a small thing that someone has to go without and it is small, IF it happens to that person only once. But the fact is that the last person in any line and the last person materials are handed around to is very often the same person again and again. People hand materials to people they know. And the reason a person is last in line (such as mobility or sensory problems) will often make them last in every line. I have been the only person without a seat or an information packet when such things were handed out at conferences and meetings more times than I can count.
6. If you do have a shortage, make a specific effort to make sure that the most socially vulnerable people are not those left without. Those who are friends of the organizers can often help by accepting whatever shortfall happens by accident, because you know they will not be the ones excluded regularly. Like most people, I would be happy to stand or share materials with someone else as long as I am not made to feel excluded by consistently being the one left out, I feel honored to help a friend who is organizing a group by accepting a shortage.
7. You can also often get around a shortage by coordinating. If you realize there aren’t enough information packets for everyone (and you should definitely have someone count before handing them out), ask for volunteers who can share a packet. Many people come to groups and events together, some dislike information packets and know they’ll just lose it anyway. You should have no trouble coming up with several people who sincerely don’t mind.
8. Places to sit at meals are specifically sensitive to the human psyche. It probably comes from some prehistoric evolutionary pressure in which those who were not given a place to sit at meals were less likely to survive. In any event, not having a place inside the circle at a common meal brings up intense fears for those who have been excluded in other social situations. If you find yourself in a situation where places at meals are insufficient or clearly unequal (with some outside or at makeshift places), consider one of these alternatives to combat social exclusion: A. stagger meal times and let people choose between lunch at 12 or 12:30, B. assign places based on specific physical needs (some people may need regular chairs due to mobility disabilities or small children, those with allergies or other disabilities may need to be ensured a place away from hazardous insects, as in my previous example), C. specifically mention to the group that there is a shortage and ask those who can take the possibly problematic alternative to do so automatically (ask that those who can easily sit on the ground do so at a picnic with an insufficient number of chairs or benches), D. assign seats and rotate them to encourage participants to get to know each other or E.  ask participants to ensure that they sit with different people at each meal, mentioning that meal times are one of the best times to get to know others and exchange ideas, as well as one of the keys to the inclusion that will make your group successful in its specific endeavors.
9. Hand out schedules and materials for your event, email them to participants and/or have them available for those that want them. It is amazing how many complex events, such as our week-long retreat with several workshops each day only post one copy of a printed schedule or have none. Certainly, plans will change, but the more your participants know about the schedule you are shooting for the more confident and included they will be. Information will always tend to flow more easily to those who know organizers personally and to those who have a lot of friends within a group. If schedules and plans are not circulated carefully, those who are already on the fringes will become truly excluded.
10. Announce schedules as well. Repeatedly. If there is no one time when everyone can be expected to be present, announce schedules and changes at various times, keeping in mind that not everyone is able to stay up late at night and some may miss the first morning announcement. Announce scheduling changes at various times of the day. Be aware that large portions of humanity have difficulty assimilating written information and other large portions have difficulty with oral information. Sometimes this is due to a specific disability, but often it is just learning style. Use both print and oral announcements to ensure a greater possibility that information will reach everyone. If a participants roll their eyes over repeated announcements, as them to ensure that those on the fringes get the information. Information is a large part of inclusion.  
11. Ask presenters to make handouts of what they plan to write on a board or flipchart or project as a PowerPoint presentation. Either distribute them or announce that they are available to those who need them, if you want to save paper. Don’t wait for participants to ask for help with this. Most people who truly need handouts won’t ask either out of a desire not to disrupt the work of the group or due to previous experiences with exclusion. There are a great many types of people (all those with visual impairments, those with reading disabilities and other sensory difficulties, those with small children or medical needs that may require them to leave a presentation for a moment and so forth) who will benefit greatly from having handouts of what may be displayed in front of the group. I have read posts by presenters who specifically say they don’t want to give hand-outs in order to ensure that participants have to give them full attention. So, you may run into some resistance from presenters. Simply mention that visually impaired people can’t see the front of the room and you are very likely to have visually impaired participants (as you are if your group is more than twenty people). Most people can understand this simple connection, even though many others will benefit.
12. Make every effort to make spaces and materials accessible to those with mobility and sensory disabilities. Effort counts here because clear effort toward accessibility sends a message of inclusion. I know many wheel-chair users who would feel excluded in a venue that had stairs at every entrance, even if they could theoretically get someone to carry them up and down. They would not be able to go outside on a short break with everyone else and they would have to undergo a public and often humiliating process to get access to the building. If you’re running an event for a public agency or large business with the resources to afford accessible venues, sign interpreters and Braille materials, you must ensure these things, regardless of local laws, or you can’t be considered an inclusive organization.
13. However, if your organization is small or your event is ad hoc real inclusion can be achieved with handmade ramps and volunteer readers along with other creative ideas. Even if the solutions may not be perfect, the point of accessibility is inclusion. Effort is paramount because 90 percent of inclusion is about social relationships, rather than physical barriers.
14. I propose a rule for introductions and helping participants get to know each other. Always make formal introductions if A. your group is smaller than 20 people and the event or meeting will go for more than an hour, or B. your group is smaller than 50 people and the event or meeting will go for at least one day.
15. If your event goes for more than one day, it is highly recommended that you use some sort of a game or ice breaker activity to help people get to know a few others in the group (ideally those they don’t already know). This can be done in even very big groups, although the goal in a large group is not to introduce everyone to everyone else, but to allow people to meet a few others and have some meaningful exchange.
16. Repeat introductions on the second day of a multi-day event with more than ten people are also a very helpful. Use humor or use the opportunity to help yourself or other organizers remember names. Go around a circle and call out names again. This not only makes people feel included and recognized, it helps the organizers to know names AND it helps participants memorize names as well. Using another person’s name in conversation is a well-recognized key social skill that means the difference between connection and the lack thereof. If you want your participants to be included and to form meaningful connections and thus do good work, your goal should be to increase the likelihood that most of them will know each other’s names.
17. That reminds me. Use humor, not only about forgetting people’s names. Use humor about lots of things involved in inclusion. When integrating the vocabulary of inclusion into your materials and introductory remarks, use humor to indicate that you know these things can sound like empty phrases and to prove that you value them at the core.
18. If you must use name tags (which I have to admit are probably helpful to a lot of people even if they are the bane of every blind person’s existence), you might joke about your own difficulties with name tags in order to point out to the group that some people can’t see name tags at all. That is often all it takes, a minor mention, and people will be more aware and less likely to exclude those who can’t read the name tags for whatever reason. Humor can be used in many ways to both lighten an atmosphere and to remind people of truths they already know and might otherwise be offended at being reminded of, even though they actually do often need reminders when it comes to inclusive group dynamics.
19. You may feel that some of these tips don't apply to high-level professional, technical or financial meetings. Of course you have schedules and your presenters don't need to copy things for everyone. Disabled people, non-native English speakers or people with family obligations don't work in your field anyway. Consider the fact that this may be precisely why people with specific differences don't work in your field. By assuming everyone can navigate these issues without being connected to the group, you severely limit the pool of talent you can work with. I have intentionally limited these points primarily to things that take little extra time and only a bit of specific attention. This is not about making cumbersome or expensive changes. It is primarily about reaching your group goals. When all is told, well over half the population falls into some category that can be inadvertently excluded. And these talents can be activated with minor changes that promote inclusion. 
20. Finally, expect mistakes and shortcomings. No organization is perfect and leaders can do a lot to help a group become more inclusive, but they cannot force it entirely. Accept that sometimes exclusion will happen anyway and be on the lookout for it. When I was excluded at my mountain retreat, the exclusion didn’t end just because organizers took note and took some hasty steps to try to mitigate the problem. But it did improve, and more importantly, I became included by the mere act of openly addressing the issue. Don’t be discouraged by the impossibility of perfect inclusion. This is one area where the old A for effort you may have sneered at in elementary school is actually a well earned and perfectly honorable accolade. 

Inclusive group dynamics is a hot topic in business and public administration in some countries and the skills to lead a group in this direction are in demand. I hope I can use experience to help leaders develop ways to make events and organizations more inclusive. 

I’m sure my list of tips isn’t comprehensive or universal. There are probably plenty of things I missed. Please feel free to add to the discussion with your own ideas and tips to help others. Post ideas and questions in the comments below. Many thanks for reading and discussing!

I developed these tips as a volunteer because I care about people. It's my way of giving back for all the good things in life. My job is writing though. Here is what puts dinner on the table: my dystopian thriller The Soul and the Seed, which tackles social exclusion in a dark alternative reality that reflects uncannily on our world.  It relevant to the topic at hand but mostly it's a story you won't want to put down.

Fighting climate change: Exhaustion versus necessity

My husband lies on the couch—barely able to move, fighting a wracking cough.

“For three weeks, I asked you to buy or cut some stakes. It would have taken only five minutes! I know you’re tired, but sometimes you have to do things anyway. Now the tomato plants are ruined and broken. The trellis I built with scraps collapsed. You couldn’t be bothered to help when it was possible to save the crop, even when I had put months of work into the garden and I was only asking you for five minutes!”  

As we struggle against climate change the effects are making that farming and everything else harder - Creative Commons image by Kevin Dooley

I stand over him--furious, drenched with sweat and shaking from an hour's hard effort trying to save what I could of our once beautiful tomato crop. 

I’m legally blind. I can handle most things in the garden, but I never learned to cut poles with an ax and I can’t drive to the lumber store. So, I had asked and pleaded and warned him for weeks. I could see that my fragile tomato trellis wouldn’t hold up.

That’s right. I’m fighting with my exhausted husband over tomatoes. Homegrown, organic tomatoes.

We live in a country where organic tomatoes are far beyond the means of the average family. They are only for the wealthy. I had hoped, planned, schemed and sweated to beat the odds and make them available to us from our own garden.

But I’m not really just fighting about tomatoes. Gardening is part of our commitment to living in an environmentally sustainable way. It’s not just about tomatoes, organic or otherwise. It’s about fighting climate change, the threat that hangs over us like an ominous cloud—heralded by increasingly unbalanced weather, unmanageable plagues of garden pests and waves of refugees from the south on the news every day.

Lake Hume at 4 percent - Creative Commons image by Tim J Keegan

“I’m exhausted.” My husband’s voice is anguished. He coughs again, doubling up. “Every day. I’m just living from day to day, barely making it.” 

Don’t I know it? I don’t rest between 6:00 am and 11:00 pm, almost never stop moving unless my hands are going at 70 words per minute on a keyboard. And I feel guilty about those few hours, because I’m doing something I love—writing part of each day, rather than only doing the grueling parts. 

I sit down and take my husband’s head on my lap. “I know. I’m sorry. I know how tired you are.”  

I feel guilty because my herbalist skills have not been able to keep his chronic cough at bay this year, after six years of relative success. Is that part of the worsening environmental conditions too?

Fear seeps in around me. I am utterly exhausted myself. I’m trying so hard to live in an environmentally sustainable way and it's a lot of work. 

The scale of the forces fighting over the future - Creative Commons image by Kevin Dooley

We don’t own a TV. We grow a lot of our own food now. We don’t use a clothes drier except in the very middle of the winter when nothing will dry outside at all. Our house is extraordinarily well insulated. We use only small amounts of energy to heat. Solar panels would be relatively ineffective on our north-facing slope, but we’re saving for them anyway. Our light bulbs are the low-energy kind, even though they make it even harder for me to see at night with my low vision. I obviously don’t drive. My husband does, but he often takes the train to work, even though it means a 30 extra minutes of commute time. We all own good bikes and use them when we can. The kids and I get around on foot, by bike and by train. 

Okay, I fly. Once every two years usually. To see my family across the Atlantic. I know it’s a big one. And it’s hard to give up. 

Would I stop flying if I knew it would make the difference? Sure, I would.

The problem is that it wouldn’t.

If I as an individual never saw my family again to skimp on my carbon footprint, it would make no difference in the number of flights crossing the ocean. I would suffer the loss of my parents, brothers, nieces and nephews. My children would lose grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. For nothing. That’s the hard part. 

The hard facts

There are facts about climate change that we can’t avoid. Most of these are so basic that they’re documented in a wide variety of sources, but I’ll list a few good links at the end, in case anyone wants to check me. 

Even so, I’m not really writing for climate skeptics. I’m writing for people like me, those who are already very concerned about climate change. The facts aren’t really controversial. It’s what we’re supposed to do about them that is problematic:

Mongolians trying to farm amid extreme weather - Creative Commons image by Asia Development Bank

• Unprecedented swift climate change is happening.
• It is caused by human activities, primarily CO2 emissions from burning fossil fuel. Almost all scientists agree on this. Those that don’t are invariably linked to the oil industry and others who don’t want to admit the truth because reducing emissions would negatively impact their business.. 
• If we don’t drastically reduce our greenhouse emissions across the board, the temperature of the earth will rise by 4 to 5 degrees by 2100.
• That may not sound bad. But it would in fact mean huge food shortages, mass starvation. Vast areas near the equator which now have high populations would become uninhabitable, we would lose many more species, and sea level rise would wipe out the Netherlands, much of Vietnam, 316 coastal American cities, island countries and many many other places 
• Even if you live in a relatively cold and high elevation area like I do, logically you have to know that life will not be good if this happens. Even if Central Europe or Canada somehow avoids direct devastation and famine, we will be beset from all sides by seas of desperate refugees, starving and landless. Our economies will not be able to absorb them and if we don’t give them relief, we will be the targets of war and terrorism.
• The lifestyles we are living now will not continue for more than a few decades, no matter what we do.  Either we change or we will be changed.
• There are things you can do to reduce your personal impact on climate change. Most of those things are difficult, time-consuming and/or expensive. Doing all of them on a shoestring budget leads to the exhaustion my family is experiencing.
• Unless most of humanity joins you in doing these things, it won’t matter.
• It is physically POSSIBLE for humans to change course and only end up with a 2 degree rise in temperature by 2100, but even that rise would cause significant suffering and hunger for our grandchildren. And such a change of course would require a reduction of CO2 emissions of around six percent every year for fifty years. 
• It’s theoretically possible but sociologically extremely unlikely. No country has started to significantly reduce CO2 emissions on the levels needed and mitigation of this disaster would require intense and well-coordinated change by all or almost all major producers of CO2 emissions sustained over decades.
• No one anywhere has yet achieved a 6 percent reduction of CO2 emissions in a year, let alone continued to reduce by that amount year after year.  
• Scientists routinely present unrealistically rosy scenarios of what we can achieve with climate change mitigation because that’s what they are commissioned to do. It is very hard to motivate people through despair and voters will not vote for politicians who talk about despair, even if they know it is true.
• Corporations protecting their profits and politicians banking on the next election keep climate change out of mainstream discussion, even as national and international agencies mark it as the worst defense threat--worse than terrorism or nuclear war. 
• Environmental organizations usually advise individuals to do the following things to reduce their personal contribution to climate change:

Families Facing Climate Change demonstration in Melbourne, Australia - Creative Commons image by Takver of Flickr

1. Walk, take public transportation or at least carpool, 
2. Use energy efficient light bulbs,
3. Rebuild your residence to have better insulation,
4. Never use clothes driers. Hang your clothes out to dry.
5. Grow a lot of your own food.
6. Buy organic if you can’t grow your own.
7. Eat less meat.
8. Recycle everything.
9. Only buy things with minimal packaging.
10. Choose energy plans that use more renewable sources.
11. Never fly on an airplane.
12. Write and call your political representatives to ask them for regulations requiring polluters to pay for their emissions.
13. Vote for politicians who champion renewable energy.
14. Donate to environmental organizations (usually including a link for donations to whichever organization issued the list).

• All those are good things to do and I do most of them… well, all except the never flying on an airplane.
• But if you do all or most of those things, as many of us do, you will be exhausted and burned out and have little time or energy left for activism beyond the basic letter writing, voting and donating variety. Maybe there are ways for wealthy people to pay for some of these things to decrease the personal burden but for most of us, the physical challenge is huge.
• And if only a small percent of us continue to do these things, our exhaustion won’t change much.

Past exhaustion

My husband sits up and rubs his eyes. 

“I’ve been thinking about the slug problem,” he says. “I think it’s time we got some ducks. And we might as well get chickens while we’re at it.” 

I stare at him. He is still exhausted, his shoulders slumped, his face lined. But he’s serious. We've talked about chickens for years, but always found the prospect a bit too daunting. Now we don’t just have slugs. We have a blanket of slugs. He used to go out at night and collect buckets full of them, until so many came that collecting made no discernible difference. And I can’t do much to help him collect slugs when I can’t see them.

“Is growing food still a priority for you?” I ask tentatively, trying not to look pointedly at his envelope from Greenpeace lying on the cabinet next to him. He is so unassuming that for the first year, he didn’t even tell me he was sending money to Greenpeace out of his meager paycheck.

“Frankly, if I had my choice, we wouldn't have a garden. I don’t really like gardening,” he says. 
He grew up on a farm but he was never an enthusiastic farm boy. He has no illusions about it being easy or romantic. I grew up with subsistence farming too, so we make a reasonably good team. 

I don’t know what to say. He goes through these ups and downs of despair and forced hope. 

“Would you do some research on keeping ducks and chickens in the same coop?” he asks. “Oh, and find me some sketches so I can build it. There’s no way we’ll get the money together to buy something.” 

I kiss him. Of course, I’ll do the research. Dyslexia makes that job grueling to him, just as I’ve never been very good with an electric saw or a screw gun. 

We keep trying at this. Banking on our strengths. Finding ways around our weaknesses.

Let them eat carbon protest - Creative Commons image by Oxfam International

Here’s the thing. It isn’t easy. It’s in fact very hard. We keep on. We aren’t hippies or off-the-gridders. We aren’t young and physically strong. We’re actually weakening as we get older. But we’re informed and unwilling to pretend we don’t know. It’s exhausting. We are trying and what we are doing still isn’t nearly enough. 

We have two small children and every day we face the silent question. We can't afford to give up. There will come a day when the next generation will ask if we knew about climate change in 2015 and if we knew what we did about it. 

I'm writing for people who are already concerned, primarily because people who aren't worried about climate change aren't likely to read my blog. But for those of us who are worried, the biggest question is how we can convince our neighbors, political leaders and companies to drop everything and focus on fighting climate change? Leave a ideas in the comments please.

A few sources:

• An excellent summary of facts and realistic strategies by George Marshall, founder of Climate Outreach and Information Network in Yes Magazine 
• Standard advice on mitigating climate change from the David Suzuki Foundation: 
• A comprehensive Vox article on the real science behind emissions targets and how scientists are pressured to present rosy scenarios: 
• A study and analysis by Climate Central that shows US cities threatened by rising seas: 

Confessions of prejudice: Getting educated can be a shock

It's socially dangerous to admit to having once held an unfair prejudice. Nonetheless I'm about to do just that... publicly. And, no, this isn't one of those things where I turn this around to make me look good. I had a bad prejudice. Bad at least among people I respect. 

I want to do this for several reasons:

• I have a friend who has courage and I want to measure up,
• It's one of those things, I think we individually owe the universe,
• It's possible that if I speak up, I may take some of the flack that others might unfairly face,
• I want people like me to know that prejudice is a something to change, not a reason for shame,
• And the story itself is prejudice-busting.

I have met with fairly extreme reactions in the past when I have named a certain attitude as "prejudiced." So, let's be clear. I'm talking about these two definitions from dictionary.com:

Prejudice (noun): 1. an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason. 2. any preconceived opinion or feeling, either favorable or unfavorable.

The easy way to keep this in mind is to remember that "prejudice" is "pre-judgement." 

So, here is my story...

Creative Commons image by Zuerichs Strassen of Flickr

I grew up very rural and mostly without a TV. That's not really an excuse because many people who live in cities and watch TV make the same assumptions. I'm just saying. I was a bit provincial. But I was brought up to be pro-civil-rights. My mother was the only white student made an honorary member of her university's Black Students Association back in the 1960's and we had diverse friends. I was taught to be open-minded about other people's appearances and abilities. I was born legally blind after all. 

And yet in my twenties I was a bit uncomfortable around gay and lesbian friends. Not very. Just slightly.

I had nothing against their private life, but the few times the subject of sexuality came up with them there was a combative atmosphere to the conversation and I lacked the sense of shared experience that I have with gay and lesbian friends today. Sex is part of life. It's fine to talk about what you like. It is no big deal that a gay friend and I agree on which men look hot (even if I'm married). But back then it was taboo. And that made it hard for a provincial young woman to get used to.

I got more used to it after I ended up with a no-nonsense lesbian roommate, who was instrumental in matchmaking my marriage. But she was tougher than most and tended to bury her own vulnerabilities in order to help those less educated than herself. 

Where I was truly prejudiced was in another area. I had only ever seen reference to transgender people on TV and almost all of the images were fairly flamboyant--men dressed unrealistically as women, being very loud and talking of nothing else but their desire for a "sex change." I certainly wasn't going to say anything out loud, but I secretly felt sorry for my lesbian and gay friends. It seemed like a shame that these "normal people" were being lumped together in the term LGBT with people who, in my view, seemed to be simply seeking attention and trying to be as racy as possible. 

Some years later, I was struggling with infertility and desperately wishing for friends who could really understand that painful road. I had one set of close friends who were rumored to be headed for IVF as well, but they refused to talk about it. I felt lonely and rejected, even though I knew how painful the subject could be. 

I'd known this couple for five intense years. The husband and I had been working together daily on a project for several years and I thought that if anyone would ever understand our struggle with infertility he would. 

When he finally did open up on the topic, I was in for a surprise. The reason he hadn't wanted to discuss it before was that he was transgender, having gone through the transition as a young adult. Knowing how much prejudice and stereotypes people often harbor about the issue, he kept it quiet. It's obviously a very private thing and in his case the only truly serious ongoing complication was the question of having children. 

I have rarely ever been so wrong about my guesses as to what was going on with a friend's silence. And it was telling to me that I could know a person for five years, work with him daily and never have any inkling of such a thing. I may be as likely to be taken in by prejudice as the next person, but I'm not a complete idiot. I realized immediately that this was definitive proof of the complete normalcy of transgender medical issues. 

In my friend's case it was almost entirely a past event. He isn't an "ordinary guy" because he's too awesome to be ordinary. But he fits no stereotypes and appears very comfortable with his life.

This revelation was one of a string of things that taught me an even deeper lesson than the simple banishment of a particular prejudice. It taught me to look at and recognize my prejudices, to question them and continue to grow in understanding. I am slower to jump to those silent judgments that people make when watching others. 

What's the greatest change of thinking you've undergone? Have you ever had to confront your own prejudice or seen that you were wrong in a judgment about people? I love your comments on these posts. Drop a line below and keep in touch!

Ridicule at your own risk: Do you really want to decide who "deserves" to be called fat?

The newlyweds went on a honeymoon to an island. They posted glowing photos on Facebook--enormous smiles, silly t-shirts, beaches, big hats. The sister of the bride woke up in the morning and the first photo she noticed showed her sister wearing a t-shirt with a cartoon character on the belly and her grinning husband was pointing at her slightly plump abdomen. 

Delighted and amazed, the sister typed, "Congratulations! I can't wait to be an aunt!" Within hours the Facebook wall was flooded with good wishes and congratulation for the soon-to-be parents. All was joyful...

Except that the bride was not pregnant.

What followed was the utter humiliation of the sister who started it all. She was terribly embarrassed. The couple had to post notes stating that they were not pregnant. The bride cried at length because the notion that she was " fat"  had been broadcast to all their friends and family. It didn't make for a nice honeymoon. 

Okay, it happens. Some women carry all their extra weight on their tummies. I do. I'm not very fat in conventional terms, although I'm no feather either. I carry almost everything on my belly and I've run into people who wrongly assumed I was pregnant, so I can see how this could happen. The sister in this anecdote was telling the story as her "most embarrassing moment,"  and she didn't mean to be hurtful. She ended with her concern about how the incident had truly harmed her relationship with her sister. 

But the reactions of those reading the story were shocking.

Most comments agreed with or paraphrased this one: "You shouldn't be embarrassed. Your sister deserved to be called fat if she gained weight. It's her own fault." (There was no picture included, so the people commenting had no way of knowing what the bride actually looked like. They were simply assuming she "deserved"  to be called fat.)

As I read the long list of comments, my chagrined laughter over the well-written anecdote of apology and personal responsibility quickly switched to a state that could best be summed up by one of those cartoon images where smoke starts puffing out of someone's ears. Most, but not all, of those comments were by men. Many implied that it's a woman's responsibility to have a flat stomach. 

Sure, partly it's the anonymity of the internet. People will write more overtly rude and cruel things online than they'll say in person. They don't think about the fact that this sister was partly trying to make amends and that the bride in question might well see their comments someday. They don't think... and they don't much care either.

But just because the comments are on the internet, doesn't make them less problematic. They are in fact a truer indication of people's thoughts and beliefs about others than the polite smiles of society. I often turn to internet forums to understand how people truly think. 

And I find it disturbing that most of the people commenting felt that a woman deserves to be publicly humiliated in front of her family and friends (even by accident) because her stomach is rounded. 

I'll lay out the issues:

1. We're all concerned about obesity. It's a serious health risk and spreading dangerously. Its worrying how many children aren't given the opportunity to grow up with healthy bodies, due to poor diet and lack of exercise. I'm all for educating people about the health risks of obesity and what can realistically be done about it in ways that don't shame or ridicule.
2. There are many reasons for the rise of obesity in recent years--cheap food is almost always the unhealthy, packaged and obesity-causing food; urbanization gives people less access to the space for natural exercise; the rise of eating disorders and depression, as well as childhood trauma, are linked to obesity; animal growth hormones in food are likely to cause humans to gain weight as well even though scientific research on it has been vehemently suppressed by industry; and the increase in passive entertainment such as TV and video games plays a role. Certainly, we can control some of these impacts in our lives but not all. It takes significant effort and money to ensure that your food doesn't contain growth hormones and poor people don't stand a chance. The idea that obesity is primarily about a lack of effort and self-discipline has been scientifically discredited.
3. Many people struggle with self-discipline. I may be pretty good at setting my own work schedule and sticking to it. But I do better when exercise is part of my life (like walking everywhere instead of driving) or part of a sport (like Aikido). I can control what I eat pretty well, but I've been known to have emotional outbursts. (I'm sure that's hard to imagine. ;) ) So, I have some sympathy for those who struggle with self-discipline. It isn't a shameful thing. It's a struggle based on in-born temperament and brain chemistry. We do not all start on equal footing here.
4. Anyone who believes that we all get the same hand from genetics in terms of our body shape hasn't been paying attention to real life. Yes, if you have lots of time on your hands, you can almost always make a significant difference. It may take intense exercise and rigorous diet restriction, but most people can lose weight. For some it has to be a major focus of their life, the equivalent to a primary hobby, while for others it's a matter of a little regular effort. This is not a competition on a level field where those with motivation and discipline naturally win slim body shapes. 
5. Most women gain body weight after the age of 25. It is part of our hormonal and biochemical makeup. I have traveled in places where people lived by subsistence farming and the standard diet would not sustain a person of my size. The people in such places usually don't grow to great height. But their middle-aged women are still mostly stocky, as well as incredibly tough. 
6. I have met people of all ages and genders who can eat anything and not exercise at all and remain slim and slender. I have met plenty who can achieve a slighter shape by regular exercise and dieting. And I have met others who will always be solidly built, unless they are literally starved to the point of ill health. Just as with a disability, you cannot tell by looking at a person, if they are naturally built to be stocky and plump or if they are unhealthily overweight. A doctor may be able to after a thorough examination, but you certainly can't tell from a photo online. 
7. In today's society it's exceedingly difficult for poor people to get the time to do regular exercise or cook from scratch (which is the only way to eat healthy on a budget) or the extra money to buy the foods that truly contribute to good health. You can't tell by looking at someone from the outside what challenges they are facing and negative commenting is more likely to be unjustified and hurtful than not.
8. Fashion models and TV actors have a lot of influence on what  we consider to be "normal" today. And most of those models are starving themselves to a medically unhealthy degree. And then their agencies are trimming them further with Photoshop. The effect is that what we see in magazines and on TV are unhealthy, fantasy images of women. And yet that is what our eyes have been trained to see as "normal." 
9. Broadcast television only arrived on the island of Nadroga, Fiji in 1995. At the time anorexia and other eating disorders were completely absent. By 1998, ninety-seven percent of the population watched some TV and 11 percent of teenage girls were anorexic and had unhealthy eating habits that didn't exist before. The unhealthy images of models do impact us.
10. Even assuming that you are concerned about someone's health because they are overweight, it is worth  considering that research has found shaming to be extraordinarily ineffective in changing human behavior. Calling someone "fat" or otherwise ridiculing body shape is often excused by those who claim that they are only trying to help people become healthier. I don't actually believe that's the true motivation but even if it was, this bullying is misguided.

A Nepali woman who can best all the skinny models for eating lean, exercising and living healthy - Creative Commons image by PACAF of Flickr

I look around at my friends, most of whom were slim as young adults and teens. Now we're pushing forty and we're all different shapes. A few have health problems related to weight. A few are slim but almost all of those actually have lifestyles with less exercise and more unhealthy food than mine. Most of us are a bit chunky. Of those I know who are careful of their weight and spend a lot of time and energy on it about half show little slimming even so. 

Among the older women of my childhood, I notice that many share a similar barrel-like shape. There is the one who has been a volunteer wildland firefigther for 30 years while raising foster and adoptive kids in the mountains, there is the one who is a rancher out working physically every day and the one who cycles all over the world. I have huge respect for these women, the role-models of my life. They have shown clearly how women have value beyond the age of twenty-five and how women's shapes are truly varied. 

When I hear comments calling women who look like these hard-working heroines "fat," I'm not just disgusted, I'm furious. There's just one thing I want to say before I shut down such a conversation: "One of those tough women of the mountains is worth more than a thousand shallow bullies!"

And yet I have to remember that the writer of the story that started it all also made an insensitive comment--unintentional but nonetheless hurtful. We can all make mistakes and be embarrassed by our own hurtful words. She was admirable for the way she took responsibility and made amends.

In the end obesity is still a concern for me, but I personally don't want to decide who "deserves" to be called "fat." I know I don't have enough of the facts from just looking. If someone thinks they do know and they are qualified to call names, I say, "ridicule at your own risk," because many of those who gather at my hearth can be ferocious when roused.

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The bottom line: I don't care what she said, you don't shove... or pull guns

I can picture the scene in McKinney pretty well. The organizers promote a party on the internet. More people show up than they expect. They didn't think parts of it through, like whether or not they could invite a bunch of kids, some of whom they didn't know personally, to their gated community pool. It happens. If you've ever organized an event for more than twenty people, you know how easily things can  get misinterpreted. 

Swimming - Creative Commons image by Cal Sr

Then when neighbors get upset with the loud music and too many "guests" in the private pool, the teenagers get mouthy. I've seen it with crowds of teenagers in a dozen countries. They don't want to leave. They assume that something with fliers and on-line promotion is "official" so they have the right to be there. They came all that way. They demand their right to have what was advertised.

And crowds are hard to disperse whether you're the somewhat disorganized organizer or the police, especially when no one has a ride home yet.

Now the residents of the area are upset because the media and activists have turned it into a racial issue, because a lot of the kids who showed up for this advertised party were black and the police who came in response to calls from white neighbors were also white. And they contend that a lot of the residents there are also black, so it isn't a race issue. They just have rules about guests flooding their private pool for a public event. 

I'm an ocean away and I wasn't there, so I'm not in the business of judging what I  didn't see. But how the party was organized or why the kids were there is really not the issue.

I'm sorry about highlighting the white witness here, but white people sometimes need to hear white witnesses explain to them that racism really does exist and he says it well.  -  Teenager who shot McKinney pool party video speaks out 

There is one thing I can see. I can see the video made by a fifteen year old without an ulterior motive, a kid who was obviously a bit confused and then increasingly concerned by the reaction of a police officer. I can't hear who yelled what very well, but I can see well enough what happened and so can everyone else. 

People all over the world can see.

And we don't care what she yelled or who said what. She was fourteen and the police officer was an adult. And you don't shove a person to the ground and use a girl's hair for a handle and put her face in the dirt over words, any words. 

Sometimes I have to explain about things in America because I'm an American living in another country. It's expected. I know that although there is violence in America and police are too ready to fire their guns and especially ready if they're facing a black person, most American police officers are not out-of-control or insane and many of them are black. I've held conversations with people in Europe about this and said, "Yes, there is racism in our society and it affects the police but not all white Americans are overtly racist and not all the cops are murderers." 

But what do I say now? The police officer in the video is clearly panicked, running from one side to another, shouting orders to random groups of kids who are walking around not threatening anyone, just looking confused and trying to figure out how to get a ride home.

Was there something violent that happened before that freaked him out? According to another video, there was a scratching, slapping fight between a woman and some teenage girls. But that's all. Why is this police officer so flustered? I have yet to see any reasonable reason reported. There was a restless crowd yes. Some of them may have yelled at him. But they were children, not even older teens for the most part. You expect me to believe that the police officer was that afraid of children, so afraid that he had to yank them by their arms, shove them down, use a girl's hair as a handle to force her head down and then pull a gun?

You can say this was just a cop with a mean, aggressive personality, but it didn't look that way. He didn't look like he was just abnormally aggressive. In the video he looks confused, irritated, panicked and frustrated that his orders are not being followed. Did he receive no training for dealing with a situation like this? Wait. No, as it turns out, he was the trainer, the senior officer in charge of new guys. 

How could he not know that the first duty of a police officer is like that of a doctor. First, do not make the situation worse. 

I'm sure there are plenty of rants out there on the internet about how bad cops are. This isn't one of them. I have seen police who lived and worked by the principle of mitigating harm and keeping the peace. I organized antiwar demonstrations in a major European city for a couple of years. We never had a riot or property damage or anything that made the international news, but there was the occasional tense incident. 

I remember one in particular. It was one of the first big demonstrations, thousands of people, crammed into narrow, echoing medieval streets. We only had megaphones, no sound system. there was no question that we were going to really do crowd control. The best we as organizers could do was stay ahead of the crowd and gently guide it in the right direction. 

Emotions were running high. The war in Iraq had just begun and European public opinion was aggravated by the policies of George W. Bush. And a fourth to a third of the demonstrators were Arabs, often very emotional Middle Eastern students. Riots had broken out in some cities. The police had reason to worry.

We arrived at the US Embassy to deliver our petition for peace and found that instead of the usual line of relatively friendly looking cops, we were facing a phalanx of riot police with shields and tasers, and no doubt, tear gas. The street was blocked with a barricade some distance before the Embassy. I definitely felt a bit nervous walking up to that in the front line of the march. I couldn't see it with my bad eyesight but others could see US Marines standing in the windows of the Embassy with guns.

Once we got the crowd stopped, we were negotiating with the police to let one of our organizers through the barricade, so that he could personally deliver our signed petition to the Embassy. A police officer asked him to take his backpack off and just as he was putting it down there was a deafening "bang!"  It must have been a cherry-bomb-type firecracker, the type that could blind you if it went off in your face.

I was sure that things were about to go to pieces. I ducked down against the police barricade, hoping against hope that when the police charged they'd just somehow go over me. There were screams and yells of anger from the crowd. But the police didn't come. 

Instead I heard a firm, loud voice of command moving down the line of police. "Everyone okay? Everyone okay?"  The police commander was checking with every section of the line to make sure no one had been hurt by the explosion.

Slowly I stood up and looked back at the police. They hadn't moved. 

I learned to respect the local police that day. They had trained to control their reflexes and not to panic in the face of a emotive and angry crowd. Over the next couple of years I was involved with several negotiations between them and demonstrators and we were always able to work things out. Not every city is that lucky. 

And what happened in McKinney isn't unique. It is only in the news because a fifteen-year-old shot a video of it. Things like that happen all the time - worse things, incidents where people end up hurt or dead. And we usually only hear about it when it is so well-documented that there is no way to escape the truth. 

I am not against police officers. I have deep respect for the job. I'm an activist but I don't believe that "the man"  is all bad and we don't need any law enforcement. All you need to do to see how bullies and mobsters rule when there are no police is to look at the international scene where the one with the biggest military calls the shots. 

But that does not mean that the police should become just another bully with a bigger stick and a readier gun. Just because someone wears the badge does not mean they are in any way outside either the law or basic ethics. 

If I've told my kids once, I've told them a thousand times.  I don't care what your sister said. I don't care if your brother spit at you. You don't shove. You don't yank hair. That's not okay. If you do it is the job of the police to come and stop you and put you in time-out. The police in your case being Mama. And Mama will be firm, but Mama won't swing you by your arm or use your hair as a handle to force your head down or scream profanity at you or bring out the big guns. Because the job of police (and of Mamas) is to mitigate strife and protect and to not make things worse.

The original video of the incident in McKinney: Worth watching if you haven't seen it.

As far as McKinney goes, I've heard the various accounts of the context. But just as when my kids squabble, context only matters so much.

Here's the bottom line. There's a fourteen-year-old girl and there's an armed adult. The adult has no reason to be afraid. She was not a threat. The guys who approached the police officer were not a threat. Drawing his gun was an escalation. It made things worse... much much worse than a crowd of young teens ever needs to be.

As to the racial tension inherent in the situation. How can that possible NOT come up? You have a white police officer attacking a black girl in a bathing suit, clearly treating her as a violent threat. He had just told a dozen or more black kids to sit down and ignored the white kid. Sure, the crowd was unhappy and milling in chaos. But no one with a day of crowd control training should expect any less. The kids weren't armed, and yet the police officer was panicked. 

And that is where it seems racial. 

The mayor and police chief of McKinney, Texas commented on Cpl. Eric Casebolt's resignation, calling his actions "out of control", referring to Casebolt throwing a teen girl on the ground during a pool party incident.

How might that officer might have acted if faced with a crowd of white seventh, eighth and ninth graders who were confused because they showed up for a party and it turned out to be a problem and they don't have a ride home right now?

I am pretty sure what he would have done. He would have asked them if they had phones to call their parents. He would have asked them in a concerned tone to move a bit away from whatever altercation was going on nearby, if there was one. I've seen officers do this in similar situations. 

But instead this officer panicked and went out of control. He didn't see those kids as reasonable or potentially in need of his protection and it's only chance that no one got shot. 

Such things are not made by just one bad, overly aggressive, poorly trained cop. It takes a society that views black teenagers as dangerous, hostile and potentially armed to do this. And in this case they were quite the opposite. Given the chaos, I'd say he was getting a fair amount of compliance. The kids close by sat down and did as he said. It was unclear what he was saying to those further away, but the fact is that legally you are not required to sit down or come hither when a police officer says so unless you are under arrest or there is a state of emergency. 

And so when European friends ask me about this I feel a sinking inside because I know this isn't just a bad cop. I know we've got problems far beyond that.

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