Astrid’s Journal

Today I had a discussion with Mr. De B. again. It started out about exams and the talk with Jan. I mumbled in agreement as De B. supposed the discussion had gone well. It did, in the ways that I think are important in getting stuff done. Then, we got to speak about applying for university. I said I still hadn’t done so, and he asked if I knew how to apply. I’ve known for three months or more. He said he’d talked with the student counsellor (English teacher says that’s the word you folks use) and that she had said that one should apply at the website. I know, but it was down and so we contacted the IBG folk and they sent us the forms. I’ll have to fill them out. De B. asked when I was going to do that. I said I didn’t know but I’d do it shortly. He insisted I tell him when I was going to do it, and it pissed me off. Who’s having to go to university, after all? He said he’s being held accountable if I appear not to have known these things or something like it. That makes no sense, for all students are supposed to have gotten to know this from the student counsellor. Why would I be an exception to this? But I appear to be. He also made some comment about caring for me. I wish I had the skills so I could get my own things arranged without people feeling the need to care for me. But it’s my own lack of skills that’s causing worry, and that’s exactly why I’m sometimes resenting the making arrangements for me and the pushing me to do certain things. Who is going to do this next year? Jan is going to contact the coordinator for access or some sort of related folk at the university. He has said he might be able to keep on reaching out to me next year, even though normally the special ed folks only offer their services in elementary and secondary schools. I’m not sure if I want him to get involved with me next year. I’m scared that if I let him remain involved, either he’s going to do too much for me, resulting in my falling flat on my face in my sophomore year due to my lack of skills in this area, or he’s going to keep pushing me to hold on (likely unintentionally, like many folks have done over this and last year), so I might remain at university the first year but will drop out in the second. Basically, I want to see if I can make it on my own with arranging my things.

Astrid

I heard on the five-o’clock-news that Terri Schiavo has died. I’m so sad to hear it. And I’m angry. Michael Schiavo even fought to have his wife be killed of starvation. Makes just no sense! Even my Dad, who, unlike me, supports euthanasia, wonders what objections there are to keeping Terri alivee. And now she’s dead. My heart aches for Terri’s parents. I’m feeling kind of weird knowing that this was possible in a normally conservative country like the USA. I mean, a fight like this one wouldn’t have to occur here, since all folks are so pro-euthanasia. But in America! (I like the Netherlands better than American in most areas, but pro-life issues are an exception.) I’m sad that Terri had to die due to a legal fight.

Astrid

The article Blindness: Handicap or Characteristic? by Kenneth Jernigan poses some interesting questions to me. The philosophy that blindness is only a characteristic, like age, intelligence, looks etc., seems to make sense, for each of these characteristics has its limitations. One would say that blindness has no advantages, whereas for example being twenty or forty or being educated does, and then you could list blindness together with being uneducated, being unintelligent, etc. as those disadvantageous qualities. But Jernigan gets to argue that even lack of education, being unintelligent etc. have their advantages, or rather, that education and intelligence are limiting. I, being a highly intelligent person, tend to agree. However, by this definition, we’re setting blindness yet more apart from other characteristics, as I cannot think of a situation where blindness is an advantage. Oh, you’re saying that when it’s dark a blind person can read and a sighted cannot? At the school for the blind, we used to make jokes where we got to see sight as a disdvantage. There are jokes of these kinds with all sorts of disability groups, and all tend to use this humour in a way to advocate to have these people respected as equals.

The “blindness is only a characteristic” philosophy seems to differ quite a bit from other disability philosophies that tend to emphasize the fact that disability is an essential part of who a person is. I have, however, discovered quite a few similarities, in that all these groups would not want the disability to be cured and argue to have their alternative ways of accomplisihg things acknowledged as valid.

However, NFB folk have a very restricted idea of what alternative techniques should be accepted and what shouldn’t. They want Braille, cane travel and the like to be accepted and taught to all low vision people. But don’t ever dare to ask for tactile warning strips or audible traffic signals, no matter how many blind people have died or been injured in accidents that could’ve been prevented if such adaptations were in place. What’s the logic in here? It sends a negative message about the abilities of blind people to have such adaptations in place. This, in turn, leads to discrimination and unemployment. Now I have never been fond of this logic, but if audible traffic signals and tactile warning strips send negative messages, why don’t Braille and the white cane? In fact, they do send negative messages, but the NFB wants to change that and in fact reinforces the stereotype concerning other alternative techniques. I do agree that in some places audible traffic signals and tactile warning strips are greatly unnecessary. However, at some places they are needed. For instance, there’s a street near my house where there used to be only a visible difference between the sidewalk and the street, until tactile warning strips got placed on my O & M instructor’s demand five years ago. And as for audible traffic signals: if you say that blind people can listen for traffic, you could say the same of sighted people looking out for it, and yet visible traffic signals do exist.

You may say that Braille and cane travel aren’t accommodations an employer or someone else must make, but usually it ain’t the employer or the like who has to buy adaptive equipment and make accommodations - at least, here it’s paid for by a Social Security type of organization. And in schools it is the school district that has to make accommodations, including braille and cane travel things (at least, in the U.S.).

But back to the article. Jernigan makes it clear that the statement “But think of what you might have been if you were sighted?” makes no sense, since we don’t compete against what we might have been but against other people. He’s right here, but then you’re presuming that the blind have superior qualities that compensate for their blindness. Jernigan denies it, but throughout the article compares blind people to sighted people who lack a certain quality, or he takes blind people with superior qualities. That’s assuming that blind people are going to compete against inferior sighted people. The most notable example Jernigan gives is the comparison of a blind person of above-average intelligence with a sighted person of average intelligence. He gets to say that the blind person is at an advantage when we want a history teacher, as if there wouldn’t be dozens of sighted applicants who have the same certifications (for which above average intelligence is required, to get the sort of education required).

Jernigan uses the example of Franklin D. Roosevelt. I was indeed surprised to find out that the former President of the United States (and the one I most admire) was severely disabled. However, this makes clear this same thing: Franklin D. Roosevelt had superior qualities. Can we say that blindness, or disability, for that matter, is only a negative quality adding up to our total mix of positive and negative qualities? That’d make sense, hence reducing blindness to the level of a characteristic. However, no Federationist would deny that a blind person has to be better than sighted persons to accomplish the same. That’s denying the idea that the average blind person can do the average job in the average time, which is also an NFB statement. Since it ain’t the average blind person, or blind people, indeed, have superior abilities that make up for their blindness and cause all accommodations that employers so hate to be unimportant. I wish it were this way.

Astrid

I was just reading an article entitled The Nature of Independence by Kenneth Jernigan. In it, Jernigan replies to some students at a rehab centre and other people, asking him why he had been walking with a sighted person at an NFB convention. They said that it was wrong to “walk sighted guide”. To this, Jernigan replied with a lengthy outline of all his accomplishments, which made me feel as if the fact that he had good travel skills allows him to use a sighted guide. So if you just aren’t as super-capable as this man is, you should struggle to figure out everything by yourself as a means of “adjustment”? He further reinforced this idea by pointing out that students should always walk with canes, and specifying that these should be solid canes (as opposed to telescoping canes) for you can’t hide them. Jernigan went on to outline the three stages a rehab student goes through: fear and insecurity, rebellious independence, and normal independence. While I can agree with this - even though for me they aren’t quite stages, more states, since I’m alternating between all three depending on my mood -, the statement presupposes that all students entering a rehab centre believe they can’t be independent, and this further leads to the idea that all they need are high expectations and the obligations to be independent (doing everything on their own) all the time. I still don’t know what expectations do about a genuine skills deficit, and what needs to be done if a person is, like me, convinced that self-reliance and independence are possible, but doesn’t know how to achieve it herself, and hence feels like showing off her independence at quite a cost at times.

Jernigan, after having received a letter by a not-so-skilled woman who, through his writing lost her embarrassment with her deficiencies, contends that we shouldn’t be that rigid with regard to independence as to say that everyone needs to be completely self-reliant. It contradicts both his former statements and other NFB writings, but I’m willing to agree with Jernigan here. Independence, here, is defined as getting what you want with minimal inconvenience. This is an agreeable definition (I’m often making up my mind about these things, so I can’t say that I agree with it), but it still seems to me that it is by the grace of Jernigan’s overall independence that he is allowed to make exceptions, and that the message in general should be that one is to be completely self-reliant. This is also the message I tend to get reading other NFB materials, and Rebecca Kragnes, in her article Sighted Assistance vs. Blind Hindrance in the March, 2004 Braille Forum agrees with me. Don’t get me wrong, I do think that blind people should be taught the skills so that they can be self-reliant if it’s convenient to them - or if it’s inconvenient to seek assistance, of course. I think that’s one reason why the NFB keeps arguing for independence and self-reliance - because otherwise we may slip back into the old stereotypes, presuming that the blind can’t do anything for themselves. However not thinking it’s that black and white, I’m often feeling that NFB folk think it’s not shameful to be blind, if you possess certain “magical” skills that allow you to be completely self-reliant, and that if you don’t possess these skills, you should be embarrassed. Jernigan doesn’t seem to agree, although his assumptions about students in rehab programmes reinforce the idea - I assume those students chose to attend the programmes, so they probably went there to learn the skills they were lacking. Hmmm, maybe I’m the only blind person int he world who just wishes she could practise the philosophy of independence and be successful enough to fit the mold of self-reliance, so that I could allow myself to be conveniently independent and assisted by people at times, without having to prove my so-called independence all the time..

Astrid

The Dutch media claim that there’s no hope for Terri Schiavo, now that the federal court has rejected her case and some judge in Florida does not want to admit her to state custody. Yet the headlines at Terri’s Fight still seem to be hopeful. Maybe the people remain hopeful till Terri has died. A cruel death. One wouldn’t wish this upon animals, and yet the courts order it to be done to a woman. I still hope that something will happen to save Terri’s life, but quite likely there won’t. Then, I’m hoping that she can die quickly, so that she won’t have to go through this suffering any longer. How insensitive some people can be, fighting over a person’s life in court!

Astrid

Jan (the folk who reaches out from the blind school to our school) is going to call the disability services person at Radboud University to make an appointment for me to speak with this person about next year. Also, the IBG sent the application forms. Why is it making me feel bad? I used to feel bad about the possibility of not having arranged anything for next year, and possibly having to move out (parents always threaten to kick me out if I don’t make arrangements). And yet now we’re seemingly getting somewhere and I’m feeling very bad. I know, I don’t want to go to university, but… Is it that? Is it that I’m scared that I won’t make it. But ain’t all high school seniors worried? So now someone is putting into effect a “kick her to college” method, as I’ve come to call all means of arranging college stuff for me. I used to be happy when folks went to arrange things for me. Not anymore, since I’m realizing that, even though there may be many other things, the most advantageous factor in this is that I won’t have to take this initiative, which’d surely have failed (as the fact that I’ve not arranged anything yet illustrates). It was the same with contacting the Loo Erf folks, but the situation was different, in that I in fact wanted to get in touch with them to see if they could help me. I don’t want to go to college at all, and now the fact that Jan is going to contact the disability services folk is coming across as a means of making sure I’ll eventually do what they want me to do. They still don’t seem to realize that the difficulties aren’t going to end magically once I get to college. Oh well, topics like independence and orientation and mobility (O & M) were addressed yesterday, and they do matter quite a bit, but they’re not what is going to keep me from making it at college, and I’m sensing that folks are too optimistic as to how I’m doing in these things, if it were to matter. And that is, of course, not speaking of social/communicative issues, that I won’t get over by September. But I’ll have to go to college, and with the application forms at hand and plan to talk to the university folk, it’s finally going to get somehwere. I’m wondering what this discussion with the disability
services folk is going to be like. My parens are likely not wanting to go with me, and I’m honestly not wanting them to go with me, for they’ll then get into things where they start making a statement and then get like: “Oh, have your say, Astrid,” so that I can say what they want me to say as if it were my opinion. But what else can one do? If people are going to leave me to make all the arrangements, nothing’s coming out of it, and if they’re going to do everything for me, that’s not quite high school senior appropriate. So Jan is going to call the disability services folk at the university to make an appointment for us (Jan and me and possibly my parents) to discuss things that have to be arranged, and then I’m going to explain everything everyone tells me to explain. I hope it’s going to work out.

The entire discussion with Jan yesterday went like this, besides that these kinds of discussions are a lot less important than college arrangements. It started out already good with Mr. De B. stating that we’d prepared for the discussion last week. He started out about exams and in the middle of a sentence said: “Well, let you say it, Astrid.” Firstly, I had no idea what he was planning to say, and secondly, I began to have a feeling as if I were only there to communicate another’s ideas (I’d not addressed anything last week) so it seemed as if I had a role in the discussion. If I had had the ability to arrange all my things on my own, this wouldn’t have had to occur, but it ain’t that way, unfortunately. Throughout the discussion, I got the feeling as if I had nothing to say besides repeating what I was supposed to say. There were times when I tried to communicate a statement, but it seemed to fail miserably - my poor communication skills again. Strangely enough, I’ve never before had a discussion in which the phrase “with your agreement” or something along those lines was used as often. I grew increasingly upset, but with the “stuff has to be arranged and how you’re doing doesn’t matter for a while” mindset, I had no ability to express it. Now I must say that I quite perpetuated it, with my statement that it wasn’t me saying so, when Mr. De B. said that *that* wasn’t the problem (I don’t remember what it was, but implying that something else, the social/communicative thing, is a problem). Afterwards, Mr. De B. asked me about the discussion. I said something that wasn’t all positive (I can’t remember what exactly I said) and Mr. De B. reacted that it was recognizable. That, to be honest, made me feel even more upset: I don’t care that my distrubed communication is finally recognizable to you folks, for you’ll only have to be involved with me for another three months, and at university they won’t recognize my weird communicative quirks. And all the folks may be optimistic, but I’m convinced that I’m not going to get over this problem by September.

Astrid

Why are they always the liberals or progressives that want to “end suffering” by killing people, even without their own consent? The media in this country keep informing us that they’re mostly Republican politicians that want to keep Terri Schindler-Schiavo alive. And since most Dutchmen would be Democrats, if not more left-wing people, we’re supposed to find that Terri should be euthanized. Euthanasia, even actively ending a terminally ill patient’s life, is legal here, and there’s no debate whatsoever about removing feeding tubes. Why a feeding tube, in Terri’s case, by the way? If she’s truly in a PVS (Permanently Vegetative State), removing another of her equipments, that would lead to an a lot less cruel death, would be equally effective, right? Or is simply not being able to eat as healthy folks do and not beIng able to communicate the way you’re expected to, being in a PVS?

It makes no sense at all to decide for another that she is going to die, and certainly not if there’s disagreement amongst the relatives. If Terri’s parents were also convinced that Terri would want to die, it makes sense to think that she would really have expressed death wishes - for so far as a person who is in a PVS can express death wishes, huh? Some folks say we should make a distinction between actively and passively ending a person’s life - passive euthanasia has rarely been an issue -, but death from starvation is such a cruel death; it will be taking two weeks for Terri to die in this way. But yeah, since she is in a PVS, she won’t notice it anyway, huh? And so her husband can decide what to do with her, even without a motive, fighting the entire legal syste to have her killed. What for? For Terri’s inheritance, or what? I’m becoming cynical. And of course judges are better than doctors in authorizing such an act. Of course! I hate to agree with the Republicans more than with the Democrats, but in this case, I do, and I’m hoping that the new law can save Terri’s life.

Astrid

I’m comparing this year to 1998 and 1999. Sometimes, I want to compare it to 1999, being hopeful that next year (sorry, this September) I’ll be in college doing fairly well (or pretending to do so). Then I suddenly realize the date, and I know I’m behind on my “schedule” if I had to act the same as in 1999 my parents did. By March 1, they had a discussion with the school folk. I have had a brief talk with the director of studies at the open day in November, similar to a brief discussion my parents had with a school folk on February 24, 1999. Yet now I’m totally off-track. And besides, I have no idea of how to arrange all these things. It’s more than simple “kept from” feelings, although these play a role as well. It’s uncertainty as to whether I’m actually ready for college - and if I ain’t, what else to do (but this is mostly out of the question now, or a miraculous alternative should pop up out of the blue) -, it’s uncertainty as to how to go about addressing the folks, what to tell them, how to advocate for myself. Standing up for oneself has never been a strength of mine, and it’s been quite a weakness that’s burdening me over the past few years, along with the entire spectrum of communication skills and social interaction, by the way. And since I’m becoming increasingly pessimistic about myself and feeling increasingly stressed about having to do all kinds of things I don’t even understand, I’m becoming less capable of even carrying out these things. Besides, if only it ended with making the arrangements! If someone kicked me to college to make it there, as my parents did with me in 1999, would I keep up? I don’t think so. And when you get into practical things like independent travel, it’s even complicating the situation further. The folk at ‘t Loo Erf askedme about this last week, and I pretended that I wasn’t worried about that at all - stick with your paradigm, huh? I don’t remember why she asked me about it, probably when we were discussing my college concerns.

Sometimes, I so want to retreat, like I did in 1998 and 1999. In 1998, I was surprisingly excited about going to the new school. I probably disappointed my parents with it. Of course, I knew that it was cause I wasn’t, according to the remedial educationalist, ready for normal school, but an 11-year-old is allowed to be excited about such things even in these situations. I hoped, I remember, that folk at this new school would be able to help me with my difficulties, as highlighted in the 1998 report, and probably also on my “action plan”(literal translation of Dutch word “handelingsplan”, meaning a plan in which it’s written what they want to work on over the year, similar to IEP but much less formal), but they never acted upon this plan as far as I’m concerned. But I cannot retreat like I did then, since I will have to make a transition (I had to in ‘98, too, but a lot less severe), and I cannot retreat like I did in 1999, cause I have to make my own arrangements and I’m behind on my “schedule”. If I compare this year to 1999, I’m stuck with a very intense feeling of fright, for it reminds me once again of what transition I’ll have to make and I’m not ready for it at all (other than in 1999, when I thought I was ready). And if I compare this year to 1998, I’m feeling two different feelings that are not quite compatible: firstly, I’m feeling some hope that someone will be able to help me with my difficulties, and yet I’m also feeling a sort of shame, for in 1998 I had failed, and my allegations that I’m not ready for college do the same (except that I don’t have a formal folk saying the same). I’d rather compare this year to 1998, for the feelings and hopes associated with it are a lotmore positive, but I don’t know how to do that, since I’ll have to go to college (and if I didn’t have to, wouldn’t know an alternative). It overall makes me feel quite weird when I get into a 1998ish or 1999ish state of mind, for these feelings can become quite vivid. I’m scared cause it ain’t 1999 and most certainly not 1998. I am in a much more serious situation than I was in 1999, let alone 1998, and I have much bigger duties to deal with. I cannot retreat and daydream like I used to be able to.

Astrid

So, where to go from here? The folks at Het Loo Erf want to do an evaluation. That means it’s at least quite likely they can help me, otherwise they would not waste all that time on me. Mum says they have to get money, too. What a stupidly sarcastic remark! Mum hates service agencies for the blind, I know, and she hates to admit that I’m not doing that great. I told De B. today that the folks want to evaluate me further. I don’t know what’s coming from this, but I’m sure there are at least some folks that cannot agree with it at all. My Mum is very skeptical about these people altogether (even though she’s the most eager to say I need to go there), my father is simply indifferent, and I don’t know what Mr. De B. expects the folks to be able to do - communication is his paradigm (and mostly mine, too), mixed with a bit of college concerns -, so their recommendation will likely define his reaction. I will see what is coming from that eval. I don’t know yet at what term they can schedule the thing, but I will receive a phone call from the admission folks.

College is not working out at all. We got a reply from an IBG person saying that he would send us the application forms. I’m just going to fill them out and return them. Maybe we will get to discuss the topic at our next meeting with Jan on Wednesday, but I’m reluctant to address the issue, since everyone in their right mind who gets to know that I’ve not made any arrangements with the university and have no idea how to do that either, will jump out of his skin in disappointment. I’m feeling increasingly like I just don’t want to do any of this anymore. But no-one sees that I’m simply not ready for this f*cked up stuff. All my difficulties won’t magically disappear once I go to college, and besides, my issues should have been resolved already, especially the communication stuff (my real problem in making the transition to college). Sometimes, I wish people would just kick me to college and I would see what happened then. But I’m not eager to have a “1999 effect”. You don’t know what that is? It’s the feeling I had when starting normal high school in 1999, when I wasn’t keeping up at all and the only argument for holding on was that otherwise Bartiméus would be right in their low expectations of me. Both the angry one within my mind (Carol I call her), a bit supported by Clarissa, and the go-getter part (Jane) use this occurrence to their advantage, and I have to admit I’m becoming much more weary of the “just kick her around, since no-one will have to listen to her clues that it’s not going well” attitude than I was at the time.

Still, the current feeling is very similar to that in 1998, when I could not go to normal school. The difference being that it is now my decision and no negative or positive recomendation can determine the outcome. Man, am I still not sure of whether to go to college? I should have arranged stuff long before, and I’m still doubting. But it’s not really doubting. Even the go-getter part uses more shoulds and have tos than wants and wills in her arguments. I know, a fighter attitude is at times just a must and nothing of will or choice, and I have very well had these experiences in order to keep up. Still, the recent urges to hold on and not show how I’m feeling are more cause I should, according to this part of my mind, hold on and otherwise it will go wrong and I’m not allowed to fail, than that they are pieces of advice on how to make sure I can achieve my own goal. But who cares, at this moment? Stuff has to be arranged and chances are that I cannot even go to college this year cause of not having arranged stuff in time.

Astrid

I’m feeling increasingly bad lately. Sometimes, I think we’re getting somewhere. I had a discussion with a woman from Het Loo Erf (centre for the blind) last week. She is a psychologist with the vocational rehab department (think you folks call it that in English). At first, I thought the discussion was going pretty well, but over the week I’ve been thinking about all that went wrong during the discussion. I have so much difficulty explaining my situation. And I so wish it were simple, like Mum often puts it. The folk called me back today saying that they wanted to do a further evaluation. She will get back to me tomorrow with details. I’m so scared that I’m way too complicated for these folks - cause even though I don’t expect magic from them, you never know what the folks think to be workable -, or, on the other hand, that these folks will think that the difficulties I’m concerned with are just imagined and I’m further just [misc. negative quality]. Oh well, I have at least one positive quality - last week this folk had the thing with qualities the folks at the summer programme had attributed to me, and she said I was definitely a go-getter (one of the qualities attributed to me). I am, but I’m getting weary of it and I’m wondering how long this go-getter part of my mind will be able to keep up.

The arrangements for next year are going horribly. My attempt to apply at the IBG website went wrong and only today we received an automatic E-mail saying they’d reply to the question (the site was down) in two days. Well, usually automatic E-mails are sent within a few seconds, so I wonder how many years it’ll take for the true reply to come. But basically I don’t quite care. I don’t want to apply at all. I have no idea of how to arrange all those things with the university and all remarks I get from folks are things like “I even know what to say to these people, and I ain’t even eighteen,” from my sister (so go ahead and tell me, instead of deflating me with your stupid remarks!), “You should just E-mail the director of studies,” from Mum (so what to put in that E-mail and where to address it?), and “Don’t other blind students face these same problems?” from Mr. De B. (even if they did, that wouldn’t mean I could settle them). I’m afraid nothing is coming out of it. I tried to explain my concern about the university stuff to the folk last week, but I failed miserably at it. Mr. De B. (who had initially contacted her and had a phone call with her on February 2 told her I’m worried about university, so she asked me why. I told Dad today that if they knew of a way to kick me to college, they could go ahead and do it. He said he didn’t plan to kick me to college. So what does he plan to kick me to? Out of the house, if I don’t make all the arrangements for college? Mum has always threatened to throw me out if I don’t go to university. Lately, she modified her expectation, stating that I should present her with a plan of what I was going to do over the year. I have no idea, but I don’t see how I can go to colege, even if I magically acquired the knowledge and skills to arrange everything. It’s March, not even half a year before college is going to start. The director of studies will jump out of her skin when I call/E-mail her now. I’m so terrified of what is going to happen, and that even complicates the situation further. My folks don’t seem to understand that all this stuff is completely wearing me out.

Okay, so the first person among my relatives who reads this will get to me in fright urging me to hurry up and quickly arrange the college things before it’s too late. I want to scream: “If you folks want me to arrange my own stuff, then why the hell don’t you tell me how to do so?!!!” Maybe they don’t know how to help me with these things. Maybe therefore they tell me I should be independent. Maybe Mum and Dad and Sigrid just don’t have the answers they “even” claim to have. But my folks have never wanted to admit that kind of stuff. I remember the time in 1996, when they were seriously troubled with my behaviour. They had to get me services from the school psycyhologist. Now they dismiss the talk with the social worker in which this was determined to have been a discussion about me teasing another girl in the taxi (I did, together with two other kids, but none of the others were sent to the school psych). I remember the time in 1992 when I was transferred to special education, strangely enough on May 11, not at the end of the school year. I’ve always wondered why it was, and my parents have never given an answer beyond “You had to learn Braille,” (not till 1993) or “The school could only educate you if you would have Marianne for a teacher all the time,” (she would remain my Kindergarten teacher till the end of the year if I’d stayed there). In my memory, something happened in early 1992 that contributed to the decision (which had been made already for the two reasons mentioned above), but I cannot remember what it was. I feel my parents feel a bit ashamed of having to admit it’s not going that fine with me. I don’t care that they won’t acknowledge my issues at other times, but I do care that at this moment they’re so reluctant to acknowledge my difficulties. But I should be able to decide things for myself without my parents, to make my own plans, to present the detailed plan in a signed letter to my parents (hmmm, a bit exaggerated, but you know how I feel). I should be able to settle my own problems. I don’t even have the issues. I am a go-getter, at least, that’s what the go-getter part of my mind wants to define me as. And yet I cannot hold on. But a go-getter who can’t hold on isn’t a go-getter anymore. Sometimes, I so wish I could unite these perspectives. At times, I think I do this by trying to settle the issues, and at times, I think I might know some ways to do so. But how do I settle my issues and arrange stuff I have no idea about how to arrange at the same time?

Astrid