(photos courtesy of George Schiavone) I’m traveling for an organization which recently issued a bulletin indicating the specific travel dates to all participants. This prompted the following email thread. The names have been altered to preserve the identity of the questionable.

Sarah is an administrative Executive for the organization. She knows I am blind.

From: Steve Gladstone

Sent: Thu September 26, 2013 1:52 AM

To: Sarah Wood

Subject: Atlanta travel

Hi Sarah,

I’ve been authorized in the past to travel a day earlier than posted. I wanted to verify this with and through you that I will be traveling to Atlanta on Thursday October 24 instead of Friday October 25, 2013. Please confirm.

Thanks,

Steve Gladstone

From: Sarah Wood

Sent: Thu September 26, 2013 7:50 AM

To: Steve Gladstone

Subject: Re: Atlanta travel

Hi, Steve. Your first engagement is 7:00 pm on Friday and you are traveling in the same time zone on a relatively short flight. For this and future reference, do you mind providing detail as to necessity for coming in a day early? Thanks.

Sarah

Sent from my iPhone

From: Steve Gladstone

Sent: Thu September 26, 2013 5:28 PM

To: Sarah Wood

Subject: RE: Atlanta travel

Sure. When I'm traveling to a new environment, there is a process I go through to orient myself. For example, when a person can't see, finding a shuttle or taxi from an unfamiliar airport to an unfamiliar hotel, takes time. Gotta talk to a lot of strangers, who are always most helpful, even though there is always a fair amount of backtracking to do.

Once at the hotel, I go through the following routine:

1. Find a hotel person who can escort me to my room and show me:

How to unlock the door – if The card key goes into the slot vertically or horizontally, the rhythm of how slow or fast to pull it out of that slot... then I have to mark the bottom left corner of the card with a piece of tape so I know where the top is so I can position it correctly. Gotta practice this a few times.
Tour the bathroom to find the soap and distinguish between the little bottles (once I washed my hair with body lotion), learn how the shower works, where to find the toilet, the toilet paper, the sink, the towels and the trash cans, then onto the bed, the drawers, the closet and the do not disturb sign.
Where the thermostat is and how to work it. Some of them can be very tricky as they might move in 1/2 degree steps (I think that was Detroit), some are digital, some have knobs, some have all the controls inside a panel, etc.
Next is the desk, how to operate the hotel phone, where outlets are so I can plug in my devices, how to work the TV remote control (that alone takes a good 10 minutes and I don't even watch much TV but I use it to fall asleep at night and that sleep mode is tricky to operate).

2. Once I have memorized all the above, I then ask my hotel employee helper to show me the way from my room door to the elevator so I can count the number of steps it is from those 2 points. Unfortunately I must do this a few times with my helper to set it in my guide dog’s mind. What is cool though is that my dog Billy, once he learns this route, gets me from my room to the elevator fairly quickly on subsequent trips. He’s pretty impressive!

3. Now I must learn the elevator. Oops, I forgot, I first have to learn where to find the up and down elevator buttons. If there is a plant or framed picture near the buttons, that helps. Invariably they are on a wall and may be between the first and second or the second and third elevator, and when there are 2 banks of 3 elevators facing each other, it gets real tricky. I need to mark whether or not I turn left or right depending on which elevator I exit to get back to my room. (I think it was also Detroit where the elevator buttons weren’t even on the wall but on a pillar in the middle of the room in front of a bank of elevators. I'm certain the person who designed this lobby didn't have any blind relatives or friends, though maybe possessed an abnormal sense of humor.)

Now to the elevators. When there are 6 elevators operating, you gotta listen real closely to catch the one that is opening. Some of them are pretty quiet. Billy does a good job getting me inside once I give him the command to “find the door.” Each panel in each elevator in each different hotel takes time to learn. It sometimes annoys folks because I ask the hotel employee helper to push the "hold door" button while I learn the panel. But I do learn it fairly quickly. BTW, some panels have Braille on them but the panels tend to be waist high and I’m a tall guy so I prefer not dropping to a knee to read the Braille and I just count buttons. It’s a little quicker that way.

4. Once I'm on the ground floor… Oops, I forgot to mention that the last hotel in New York where I had to take 2 elevators to get to the ground floor took extra time... we count steps again to get outside and now we have to find an area where I can relieve my dog. In Chicago it was very tricky as there was no grass anywhere. We had to use an alleyway. Again we have to walk this route several times so my dog and I could do it alone. Of course, we need to identify a strategic trash-can along the way for Billy’s scooper bags.

5. The rest of the orientation like finding the hotel restaurant, snack store, etc. requires the step counting thing. You might be saying, “Wow! There are several routes that all have different step configurations to memorize,” and while this is true, after walking them all a few times it gets easier. It's the initial patterning and learning that take the time up front and that is why I appreciate coming in a day early. Oh yeah, when I get back to my room, it takes a little time to plug my stuff into the electrical outlets. I have to use my fingers to find the slots where the prongs go and... well, this is a very slow process as you can imagine.

Could I do this all on same day to attend an evening meeting? Sure. It is taxing to do it same day and I appreciate the low stress option of coming in a day early to orient myself.

No one has ever questioned the necessity for me to come in the day before. They always just said o-k when I requested it. Thanks for taking the interest. And if you need any further clarification, don't hesitate to ask me.

Steve

From: Sarah Wood

Sent: Fri September 27, 2013 6:12 PM

To: Steve Gladstone

Subject: RE: Atlanta travel

I hope I didn’t offend you with the question and really I was not looking for such a thorough explanation, just something to put in a file so that next year we remember to budget for this since it’s the first time I’ve learned of the extra night request for you. Now that I have the information and it will be in the file, my hope is to not pester you with further questions about it.

And yes, the buttons in Detroit were quite frustrating, even for one with decent eyesight – I turned circles before I figured out those darn pedestals had the up and down buttons on them.

Have a good weekend.

Sarah

Sent from my iPhone

The Airport

The airport for blind folks presents a unique environment of inconsistencies and some people who take themselves way too seriously. The Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport offers some fine examples.

Seeing Eye Dogs

The curb-side sign outside the FLL Airport reads: “No Pets Allowed Except Seeing Eye Dogs.” This sign begs some clarification of terms. All dogs trained to assist blind folks are not “Seeing Eye” dogs, like all tissue is not “Kleenex” and all soda is not “Coke.” The correct generic is “Guide Dog.” So when people ask me if my dog Billy is a seeing eye dog, I get cranky and resort to education. To be fair, New Jersey based The Seeing Eye was the first school in America (1929) to train dogs to help blind people navigate the obstacles they face every day while moving around their neighborhoods. There are now a dozen or so schools producing guide dogs, Billy being Florida-trained. This airport sign demonstrates the depth of unawareness for the right term even in the chain of command at an international level. The situation was about to be remedied when the check in guy asked me if I got my dog in Jersey. I offered to buy him a Coke.

Maintaining Visual Contact

I cannot maintain visual contact with my personal belongings. In the past 6 weeks I’ve been to New York, L. A. and Nicaragua. While waiting for my flights, I heard the recurring announcement to “please maintain visual contact with your personal belongings at all times.” I considered turning Billy to face and stare at my carry on suitcase but that cliché was even too much for me.

The Shoe-Nazi

I always get my ticket at curb side and take an escort to the gate. It’s clean and efficient with the only obstacle being that one in ten shoe-Nazi who insists on me removing my shoes. Just to be clear, since they always pat me down anyway, why take them off? They can swipe my footwear with a chemical and analyze it with their goggles and science kit. On my latest trip to L. A., I got that thug that behaved like Cerberus at the gates of Hades, growling at me to take off my shoes. After removing them and walking through the scanning arch, he said, “You can’t see without your dog, right?” I said, “I can’t even see with him.” Whoosh—flutter! I could hear his ears flapping as the comment zoomed past his head. He patted me down like the nefarious guy I was and I was off down the corridor once again.

The Dictator-In-Waiting

When I was sighted half my life ago, we always got our tickets at the front desk. Now checking in at curb-side as a blind dude, I missed the part when the technology changed to the friendly kiosk where you print your own ticket. On our way to New York for my son’s college graduation a couple of weeks ago, my daughter grabbed my credit card and printed our tickets to LaGuardia. Cool. When we arrived at the gate, the attendant asked for Billy’s papers. Papers? What papers? He indicated that I needed to produce “proof that he was a seeing eye dog” (snicker snicker) along with a history of his vaccinations and current blood line. The dictator-in-waiting also informed me that Billy should be wearing his certified vest. I asked dictator-in-waiting why he wasn’t wearing his certified jacket. “What jacket?” he asked. “The white straight one,” I mumbled. Whoosh—flutter! I explained that I travel a lot and have never been asked for my dog’s complete record at any airport. He said that I could not board the aircraft without it and I dropped the guy to the mat in a full nelson in my imagination. Then he noticed the service animal box wasn’t marked on my ticket during the kiosk check-in maneuver. I figured out the curb-side folks must always have check marked that box for me. My daughter was upset that I took the gate guy to task. I think she thought he was cute.

A Cautionary Tale

When you’re blind, be careful when the guy sitting next to you on the airplane is being rude, ignoring your questions or not returning the obligatory ‘thank you’ to your ‘god bless you’ when he sneezes. Though no one needs to be tolerant of the insolent, he may be wearing headphones.

Steve Actor, Music Critic, Blogger

Steve's reviews for MiamiArtzine can also be found in the "News" tab of Insight's website. Many thanks to Steve and Roger Martin for permission to post them, here.