On the Road with Barry – Plano, TX & Wadena, MN

Plano, Texas

I get to drive to this one, and I’m not upset about it at all. Flying right now is not preferable. Well, flying is OK, but security is not. I’m not going to get into the politics of it except to say this: Elected officials, all of them, are WAY more concerned with blaming one another than solving the problem. And they’re all still getting paid. Not one soul with the power to fix this has missed one paycheck, but TSA agents all over the country have. There. I’m done. I’m not sure if I feel better after venting or not. Probably not.

Anyway, the only company I can rent a vehicle from in Nacogdoches provided me with a small SUV, and I headed north. (I wonder why there isn’t a minimize button on the keyboard that lets you make letters smaller? I know I can change the font size, but there’s the Caps button that lets you emphasize things with all capital letters. I want a button that lets you emphasize things with smaller letters as well. I would have minimized the word “small” in the last coherent sentence I wrote about the size of the SUV. Who do I talk to about this?)

The one rental facility has always provided me with a vehicle. Almost always NOT (see?) what I asked for, but it always gets me going. This one is smaller, but it’s just me this time.

Jim is a guide dog applicant who asked for a brush-up of his orientation and mobility (O&M) skills while he waits for a guide dog. He’s had guide dogs from a different school for 16 years. Two dogs worked for Jim for about eight years each, which, depending on the dog and the travel environment, is on the long end of the average working life for a guide dog.

Madeira, a small-ish black lab, greeted me at the door of Jim’s apartment. She’s got a little gray on her muzzle and has the look of a dog that’s done her job. Jim and I get to know each other a little bit, then head off on our first trip.

Jim has lived in this area long enough, and eaten at the same places enough, to be considered a regular. I’ve talked about this before, but as a person living with a visual impairment, being the “Norm” of your area is not a bad thing at all. Having people recognize you and look out for you is something from which everyone, blind or not, could benefit.

There was this one place in Jacksboro, Texas, where I ate almost every Tuesday and Thursday for two years. Herd’s was no bigger than my dining room table, but they made an excellent cheeseburger. It got to the point that when I pulled up outside, they started cooking my double with cheese. After about a month, I didn’t need to order. I just walked in and gave them money, talked about the most recent football or basketball game, the weather, or whatever was going on around town, then sat and waited for my burger.

Jim is like this at two restaurants along one of his main routes outside his apartment complex. Two Brothers and Honeyberry are Jim’s Cheers. They call him by name when he comes in and look after him when he’s there. Not overdone, either. It’s clear that Jim has educated them on what he needs and what he doesn’t. It’s refreshing.

We ate at Two Brothers today, which happens to be St. Patrick’s Day. Two Brothers did have some Irish stew on the menu, but I’ve already got a spot picked out for my corned beef and cabbage tonight. The Holy Grail Pub is just around the corner from Jim’s place and not too far from my hotel. A plate of corned beef, roasted cabbage, and Irish guacamole (mashed potatoes) was as good as it should be. The pub was packed, as you might imagine, so I ate and got out of there.

The next day, Jim and I made it to Honeyberry, where they asked about Madeira more than they asked about Jim, but he’s used to that. It’s a popular breakfast and brunch spot, and you know how I like breakfast. I did just fine.

Mobility-wise, Jim is a little out of practice. This is not out of the ordinary for long-time guide dog users. You don’t forget your cane skills, but navigating without the dog is a bigger adjustment than most people realize.

So, here’s the moral to this story: Keep up your cane skills, folks. Make it a point to go somewhere, on a regular basis, without your guide dog. There will come a time when your dog won’t be with you, for a multitude of reasons, and you need to have good enough cane skills to navigate without them.

Street crossings, or getting across any wide-open space, are where I see evidence of this the most. Dogs are taught to go straight across the street, from curb to curb. Walking with a dog, you rarely veer on a crossing because this is true. If you do this for 16 years like Jim has, you tend to get used to the dog making sure you don’t veer, and lose track of the skills you use to ensure a straight crossing. This is why maintaining your cane skills is so important, because if you can’t cross the street straight without a dog, it makes life a lot more complicated.

Jim and I walked his route to Honeyberry and back the next day, and we explored some new territory around his apartment complex. We discovered a way for Jim to walk, basically, around the block (a very big block) for exercise and to help him build up his stamina. There are also quite a few driveways on the route that will give Jim plenty of practice at crossing those open spaces without his dog.

He’s got work ahead of him, and he knows it. But he’s not alone. If you’re thinking of applying for a dog, or if you have one and are contemplating retiring the dog, start working now on your cane skills. Outside of miracles, you won’t get approved overnight, and you’ll need those independent travel skills to pull you through. Whether or not a dog shows up in your life, independent travel skills are gonna be to your benefit. Get ’em. Use ’em. Maintain ’em.

If you need assistance in getting these skills, or regaining them, call us at Leader. We have a great on-campus team of certified orientation and mobility specialists (COMSs) that can help you attain, maintain, or regain independent travel skills. And if you can’t come to us, we’ll come to you. I’m sure there’s an Irish pub in your neighborhood that would feed me proper!

Wadena, Minnesota

Well, the travel gods (little g) came back and bit me in the butt. I stood in line for just shy of two hours in Houston this morning. My flight departed at 6:30 a.m., so I had to be there at 4:30 a.m.. With all the ugliness in Washington keeping TSA folks unpaid, I decided to add an extra hour of preparedness. So, I got to the airport at 3 A.M. (See what I did there? I capitalized ‘A.M.’ and you all understood the emphasis, right? You’d understand much smaller print, too, don’tcha think? I sure do.)

As it turns out, I should have just gone straight to the airport yesterday evening when I got to town. 3 a.m. at the airport — surely nobody’s there, right? Not even close. It seems as if the entire population of Houston, now the U.S.’s fourth-most-populous area, is in line in front of me. While the line kept moving, when you’re walking across the circumference of the planet, the hope that motion produces loses its effect.

And yes, people were frustrated. Who wouldn’t be? We shouldn’t be awake at 3 a.m. unless you’re the one making the doughnuts. And standing in a line longer than Gone With the Wind? C’mon, man! Gone With the Wind is still on TV somewhere because it NEVER ends! (See what the all caps does?) My clothes will go out of style while I’m waiting in this line!

I said people were frustrated, and they were, but I didn’t witness anyone being outrageous like I’ve seen on social media. There’s literally nothing you can do about the situation, but you can control how you deal with it. Most folks around me, despite the 3 a.m. part, dealt with it with humor. I met some really nice folks in line. I would rather not have met them in this way, but what are you gonna do?

I’m headed to Fargo, via Minneapolis, then driving back east a little to the town of Wadena, Minnesota. Ryan is another guide dog applicant who’s had two dogs prior. I’m starting to see a pattern here.

Ryan’s most recent guide dog, Mowgli, meets me at the door to Ryan’s office. Mowgli is a golden retriever who looks like he’d really rather hang around at the office than get out on a route. Goldens, when they age, get that white face, you know? It’s so endearing.

Allison, one of the wonder women in client services, gave me strict instructions to kidnap Mowgli and bring him back to her in Michigan, having developed a relationship with him over the years. Ryan says that Allison will just have to deal with disappointment on this part of the deal. Sorry, Allison, I tried.

Mowgli is not the young, spry dog he used to be, nothing like his namesake in Kipling’s 1906 The Jungle Book, or in the Disney adaptation. Allison will tell you, though, that I can sing every word to “I Wanna Be Like You” from the Disney version because I serenaded her when I was on campus last time and learned Ryan’s dog’s name. My mind is twisted like the root ball on a crape myrtle. If you’ve ever seen one, you’d understand.

Where was I? Oh yeah.

Ryan owns a computer repair shop in town, and it looks like you’d think a PC repair shop should look. Pieces and parts all over the place, like C-3PO in The Empire Strikes Back. You know, when he got shot by stormtroopers while in Cloud City? Anyway, Ryan knows where everything is, and that’s all that matters.

The shop is in the middle of the block on a very vibrant Main Street in downtown Wadena. Ryan lives in an apartment about four and a half blocks from the shop, which is great for him. Well, he did.

Ryan has been the victim of a series of unfortunate events for a while now. The two most recent of which I’m aware are a kidney transplant and a broken wrist from a fall after transplant surgery. He’s been living at his mom’s house since, just ’til he’s ready to be 100 percent on his own again. The transplant wasn’t unfortunate — just the opposite, obviously — but it sure put a damper on his mobility. So did the wrist.

Of course, he broke his right wrist, his dominant hand. He got to where he can use his cane with his left hand almost as well as the right, which is why I’m here now.

Very much like Jim from Plano, Ryan’s had guide dogs for an extended period of time. That, his health issues, and the weather in Minnesota have caused a slip in his cane skills. You may know this, but it’s cold and snows A LOT (see the all caps?) in Minnesota. It’s still cold here now, but almost all the snow is gone. That’s a plus.

Remember how I said that Ryan has been the victim of a series of unfortunate events? Yeah, so while we were coming back from our first trip around town, Ryan stumbled and hit his head on the corner of an electrical control box.

It was one of those deals where he had just gotten into a really good groove and was striding out with his cane, and I had subsequently backed off. And then BOOM (yep, I did it again), he’s eating a metal box.

Could it have been prevented? Yes. He could have worn a helmet, or I could have hovered around him like I was protecting a newborn, but Ryan wouldn’t have either of those options.

Also, the world is not flat, straight, or even. Nor does it have soft corners. All of us assume risk when we step out into the wide world. Those of you who are blind or visually impaired assume even more risk. I was hoping, however, that it wasn’t as bad as it looked and sounded. It was.

It didn’t bleed for a short minute, probably the body reacting to the impact. The messages traveled to the brain, telling it that it should hurt and bleed. And it did. Ryan felt the same way at first because it wasn’t bleeding. Then it did.

Luckily, Bill Stafford, my dad, taught me to always carry a handkerchief. Mine today was a new one that Rooster and I picked up at the latest street festival in Nacogdoches as a giveaway on a vendor’s table. Rooster got one, too.

It was a nice dark green, with the name of a local lawyer in town. It stopped the blood flow, and we made it back to Ryan’s shop, where we got some more professional first aid and Ryan called his mom. Not the way I wanted to meet Ryan’s mom, but she agreed with me that he needed to get it looked at.

The hole looked a lot like what I’ve read about bayonet wounds from the Revolutionary War. The British had triangular bayonets, used specifically because the triangle created a hole that was very hard to sew up.

Luckily for us, physicians have gotten better at stitching things up, and after four stitches, Ryan was ready to roll again — but not till tomorrow.

I went to Oma’s for a late lunch. Luckily for me, it was schnitzel week at Oma’s, and I was served a lovely plate of that and spaetzle by the owner, who has a lovely German accent. Perfect for someone who works at Oma’s. They bake their own bread there, too. If I haven’t already said so, it was lovely.

Ryan was showing off his stitches the next day, and we decided to go back to where he got them. Not the corner — the hospital. Ryan has spent a lot of time at the hospital lately, and he would like to get around on his own a little better than he does.

One thing Leader’s program model of O&M offers is the ability to get a lot of repetition. Repetition breeds confidence, and confidence breeds independence. When we left, Ryan reported feeling a lot better about his ability to find his different destinations inside.

After lunch, we walked over to Ryan’s apartment and back and worked a lot on recovery, which is what us COMS call learning how to get back onto your intended path. If you’ve read this before, you know that EVERYBODY (I’m smiling now …) veers. The best travelers and the worst, and all those in between, veer sometimes. It’s not a question of “if,” but “when.”

What causes the veer, in my humble opinion, is not nearly as important as knowing what to do when it happens. Expect the best and prepare for the worst, right? Having good recovery skills can make a complicated situation a little less complicated.

I went to the movies tonight. The local theater, The Cozy, is just down the street from Ryan’s shop, and I’ve been looking at the marquee for two days. There’s a movie out that I’d like to see called Project Hail Mary. It’s based on a book by Andy Weir, the same fella who wrote The Martian and was subsequently made into a movie of the same name.

I really enjoyed the first book and movie and decided that, since I liked book No. 2, I’d like the movie, too. It was also bargain night at The Cozy. I got a movie ticket, a lemonade (because they didn’t have ginger ale), and a bucket of popcorn bigger than should be allowed for under $20. A STEAL (one last one) these days.

The movie was long, almost three hours, so I rationed my lemonade. The movie was really good. I recommend it to anyone who likes space movies — or just a really good flick. The book was excellent as well, and I highly recommend reading the book first. Almost always the best idea.

Ryan and I went back to the hospital the next morning to make sure all the repetitions had done their job, and they had. I let Ryan figure some things out on his own, and he did just fine. My job is a revolving door of working myself out of a job. If I’ve done my job correctly, the client doesn’t need me anymore. At the hospital, he does not. My work here is done.

We spent the rest of our time working on his route from his apartment to work and back, a route he’ll be doing on a consistent basis when, according to Ryan, his mom lets him move out. Don’t ever change, Mom!

One of Ryan’s issues is pace. You’ve heard it from me here before, but a consistent pace will cover a multitude of sins. Like riding a bike: if you keep pedaling, you can even let go of the handlebars and still go straight. Once you quit pedaling, though, you start to wobble back and forth and lose your line.

We worked on Ryan’s inconsistent pace, and he got over some pretty wide driveways without veering. If he can keep that up, he’s gonna be just fine.

I’m headed back to Fargo this afternoon to hopefully fly out tomorrow. Breakfast and lunch were provided by the bakery next to Ryan’s shop called the Old Soul. Everything there was made from sourdough. I purchased two scones and one cookie, all still warm when purchased. I totally blew my nutrient-dense, high-protein, calorie-deficit plan today — and it was totally worth it.

Because, secretly, I thought you’d want to know, TSA was back to normal on the day of my return flight. Crazy how that happens, you know, when you pay people to do their jobs. I’m so happy they did, as a winter storm began hitting the upper Midwest as I was trying to get out. I drove to the airport in the snow and watched it pile up as I was waiting to board. We went through the whole de-icing procedure before takeoff.

Atlanta was as normal as Atlanta ever gets. I hope we can keep it that way for a while.

Written by Barry Staford, certified orientation and mobility specialist (COMS)