Blog

Mondays with Mike: Style points

November 17, 20142 CommentsPosted in blindness, Mike Knezovich, Mondays with Mike, Uncategorized

We were carless in Urbana during our visit last week, and relied on the kindness of friends (Thank you Jean, Milton, Nancy and Judy!) — as well as Zipcar and cabs—for transportation. Each ride was a nice chance to chat, and on one trip with Steven (of Steven and Nancy who are Hanni’s companions), he and I – as we are wont to do – started talking about the latest pop culture trends and oddities. One of them: The growing preponderance of young men growing bushy mountain-man beards.

The latest trend.

The latest trend.

I’ve had a beard ever since my freshman year in college. I did it in part simply because I could – I was the kid in high school who had to shave the earliest (and consequently was asked to do illicit things that only adults could do, but that’s another story). So when I went off to college (and out of parental range) I figured I’d see what I’d look like. By my lights I looked better. And, given it saved a lot (if not all) shaving chores, it was a winner.

Before we were married, Beth asked me to shave my beard, just so she knew what that looked like. I did. She concurred with my opinion about looking better with than without, and insisted I grow it back immediately. Beth’s last vision of me is when I was 27 years old, when I had more hair on top and less me in the middle. But I honestly can’t much remember what I would’ve been wearing back then or what the styles were.

Ugh.

Ugh.

I do know they’ve changed a lot over time, and I do my best – not always all that well – explaining them to Beth along the way. Beards and Layerlong hair went out and men started shaving their heads. And their bodies. During the grunge era, on campus every young man wore a ball camp and a flannel shirt. Young women have gone all Madonna, and if my mom were alive I picture her running

Ugh.

Ugh.

down the street behind women and admonishing, “Your bra strap is showing!” By the same token, there was that intentional layering thing that took hold I know she would’ve wanted to say, “Tuck your shirt in” to every young woman in earshot. For awhile now, tall boots and leggings and tunics have held the day in women’s fashion.

Men wore impossibly pointy long shoes for awhile, some men wear their pants way down low, and now we have impossibly skinny and tight pants for both women and men. And, my least favorite of all modern men’s fashion trends: The tiny suit. Don’t get me started.

Back to the bushy mountain-man beards. Apparently, it’s a real thing. And it’s enough of a thing that a new term has been coined: Lumbersexual (borrowing, of course, from metrosexual.)

Here’s a link to one blog about it. But Google it, you’ll get a lot of hits. There is now a hipster movement that has young men growing out beards and back to flannel shirts and such. But instead of axes, their tools are MacBook Pros, or so one of the bloggers observed.

Which Steven and I described to Beth during our car ride. Explaining it is another matter.

A little thumpin' thumpin'

November 15, 201412 CommentsPosted in careers/jobs for people who are blind, guide dogs, public speaking, Seeing Eye dogs, travel, Uncategorized, visiting schools

Whitney and I took a train to Champaign Wednesday to give a presentation for an animal sciences class at the University of Illinois. While we were there, we stayed at the house of an old friend: retired Seeing Eye dog Hanni.

There’s Whit with Hanni’s bone during a previous visit to Urbana.

Whitney and Hanni are both Labrador/Golden Retriever crosses, they are both graduates of the Seeing Eye school In Morristown, N.J., and both of them are very, very smart. I had no trouble telling them apart, though. Hanni is a tail wagger — you know it’s her when you hear a thump, thump, thump on the floor. She’s taken on more and more of her Golden Retriever side in these matronly years: she wears her hair long and full. Her coat matches her personality: fluffy.

Whitney, on the other hand, is a lean, mean machine. She’ll be five years old next month, and she no longer shows signs of childish jealousy that she used to on visits with her predecessor.

Fourteen-year-old Hanni is in very good hands with her people Steven and Nancy. She’s slowed down, of course, and when we enter the room, she just lifts her head and acknowledges us with the thump, thump, thump of her tail wagging against the floor. The only person she gets up to greet at the door now is her beloved Nancy. I use Whitney as a role model: I don’t show any signs of childish jealousy. Truth is, I’m joyous.

At 14 years old, Hanni still gets out regularly for walks. Sometimes, she even runs. I eavesdropped on Nancy in the other room as I buckled Whitney’s harness on to get ready for our trip back home to Chicago. “Wanna go to Homer Lake today, Hanni-boo?” she cooed. Whitney guided me out for our ride to the Champaign train station then, and we left to the happy sound of Hanni’s tail thump, thump, thumping her answer to Nancy’s offer.

It wasn't in her obituary

November 11, 201416 CommentsPosted in careers/jobs for people who are blind, guest blog, memoir writing, Uncategorized

Doretha was a soft-spoken woman with a velvety tenor voice. When she first introduced herself to our downtown Chicago memoir-writing class, she came right out and explained why she’d signed up. “My therapist told me to come.”

We didn’t hear another word from Doretha for four or five weeks. She came to class, but she just wanted to listen. Audrey Mitchell, a fellow writer, eventually took Doretha aside, talked with her one-on-one, encouraged her to give writing a try. Doretha returned the next week with a piece that left us speechless.

Doretha continued writing and reading for years and established friendships in class — you really come to know a person after hearing their stories week after week. We were all heartbroken last week when we heard Doretha had died. Audrey represented us all at Doretha’s funeral, and when she sent me her notes for the talk she gave, I asked if I could share them with you blog readers. Here they are.

The Wednesday writing class at a party a few years back. Doretha is at my right in the red sweater, and Audrey is behind Doretha, wearing a blue top.

The Wednesday writing class at a party a few years back. Doretha is at my right in the red sweater, and Audrey is behind Doretha, wearing a blue top.

Good Afternoon. My name Is Audrey Mitchell. Doretha and I shared something very important to both of us. We both belong to a memoir writing group called “Me, Myself and I: Turning Memories into Memoirs.” Our leader, Beth Finke, myself and all of the members of the writing group send our compassion and condolences to the family. We want you to know that we all have the highest esteem for Doretha.

We are a group of senior citizens that write stories about our lives for ourselves and our families. In our class, we share stories with each other by reading them out loud.

When Doretha first joined the group, she was very quiet. She only listened and did not read during first few sessions. As a new member, we wondered if she had anything to say. Finally Doretha decided to read her stories to the class and “boy” did she have something to say.

Doretha was a prolific writer. She was clear and concise in her words, sentences and phrases. When Doretha read, every one listened. She captivated the class of 16 or so senior citizens with her stories.

There are two ladies in class who have hearing difficulties and when Doretha read, they would move closer to where Doretha sat so they could hear every word she had to say. They did not want to miss anything…nor did any of the other class members.

She read her stories in way that enticed you into listening. She shared the times in her life that were challenging and as you listened to her read you could feel the pain she went through. But as she continued to read, we also knew that she fought hard to overcome those hardships to become the woman she was. She would also write about the better times in her life.

Doretha always said that writing was very therapeutic for her. She wrote to share her life events with her family and others to show life is not always grand but if you worked hard at it as she did, you can make it better.

Gregory, you and family have been given a wonderful gift from Doretha. She put her stories down on paper for you because she wanted you to know where she came from, what she went through and how she survived. As you read what she wrote in her memoirs, it will give you a very true and thoughtful picture of Doretha, your beloved mother.

May God Bless You and Your Family.

Back to me. Audrey doesn’t like to drive much anymore, but she got behind the wheel to drive to Doretha’s funeral. “I’m glad I did,” she told me later. “People there didn’t even know Doretha was a writer — it wasn’t in her obituary.”

Audrey was the ideal person to give that tribute Saturday — Doretha might never have written a word if Audrey hadn’t encouraged her. And we’d all be the lesser for it.

Mondays with Mike: No glory, just guts

November 10, 20147 CommentsPosted in Mike Knezovich, Mondays with Mike, Uncategorized

Growing up, World War II was in the movies, on TV and in our classrooms. It felt close. Everywhere. I knew my dad had served in the war, as had his three brothers, uncles on my mom’s side, neighbors. It fascinated me, it was exotic, a grand adventure. It was scary but not really scary because, after all, there he was. There they were. Our guys had won.

That's my dad Mike on the left. Brother George Knezovich center and Dave Knezovich on the right. Steve Knezovich, not picture, also serve in the Navy.

That’s my dad Mike on the left. Brother George Knezovich center and Dave Knezovich on the right. Steve Knezovich, not pictured, also served in the Navy.

My best friend’s dad — and our Little League coach — had been there, too. In the infantry. One time when I was at my buddy’s house (they had a pool table in the basement!) my friend showed me some German medals that his dad had squirreled away in their basement. We could only imagine.

As much as I wanted to know about my dad’s experience  — all their experiences — I didn’t get much. Which was more or less par for the course. My father wasn’t an extreme introvert but on the blabbermouth scale –1 being painfully quiet and 10 being verbally incontinent — I’d put him at a three. And he was pretty typical I think.

But he was tightlipped even by his own standards about his time overseas. I mean, he was in the VFW. He got the American Legion magazine. He went to the patriotic parades. But he only talked about his time stationed in France once with me. He’d been at a company softball game and drank one of his infrequent beers there.

That evening I learned how he and countless others fought seasickness on the Liberty Boats – seafaring cattle cars for troops — on the way over. He was not on the front lines, he was in the medic corps, at least I think he called it that. He took care of guys who’d been shipped to hospitals behind the lines for care. It included a little bit of everything, including some direct care, shuttling the wounded between facilities — and shuttling the dead. It was maybe a 10-minute window on his wartime experience in the TV room of our little house. I was sitting on the couch; he was lying on the floor in front of the TV, as he liked to do. I wish I’d had a tape recorder. But that was it.

He hadn’t been on the front lines and yet, I could tell he’d seen some awful stuff. Sometimes I look back and wonder if my dad didn’t talk about his experience much because of what he saw or because of what he hadn’t seen but knew that others had. One of his brothers had been on the front lines and I learned later that it changed him forever. An avid hunter before the war, he would not touch a gun again according to one relative. But that wasn’t the only change — he suffered mightily and it undoubtedly not only changed him but cut his life short. Over the past few years, I’ve made a good friend, a Viet Nam veteran, who has wrestled with PTSD ever since his time in the jungle. Surviving war is just the first step for lots of folks, and it’s always been that way.

I got to thinking about all this because, of course, Veterans Day approaches, and with it, remembrances and rituals (including blockbuster sales events). And special reports. I heard one Sunday morning on Bob Edwards Weekend. It was about medical staff who treated the wounded in the jungles of Viet Nam in the late 1960s.

It wasn’t easy to listen to, but it was riveting and poignant. I couldn’t find it online anywhere except here:

https://soundcloud.com/search?q=Stories%20from%20Third%20Med%3A%20Surviving%20a%20Jungle%20ER

It’s in four 15-minute parts. Any of the segments reminds that war is terror and butchery and it forces people to give up their humanity just to survive. No glory there.

There’s going to be a lot of blah blah around Veterans Day like there is around everything these days. Things get sort of mixed up. On one hand, there is nothing glorious about war, and fear sometimes we forget that and try to glorify veterans — and from my experience, it’s not what they want. On the other hand, I think about my dad — probably the most gentle man I’ve ever known — being put in the position he was put in. And that makes me think about everyone that has been put in that position. I don’t know how they did it.

I feel grateful that I never faced it. But I’m not a pacifist and so I’m grateful for those who have faced it. And I feel absolutely sick that without question, we’ve put people in that awful position unnecessarily way too much.

Mostly, I realize that no amount of parades, ceremonies, or expressions of gratitude can balance the books with these people. While we honor their service, we are obligated to do whatever we can to avoid requiring it.

Back to school

November 8, 201433 CommentsPosted in blindness, Braille, public speaking, questions kids ask, technology for people who are blind, Uncategorized, visiting schools

I practiced with Whitney ahead of time, so when the Dukes of Distinction presentation started Thursday night, we knew exactly what to do: follow fellow

That's the York High School Commons all done up for the ceremony.

That’s the York High School Commons all done up for the ceremony.

distinguished alum Dr. Robert Chen (“I go by Bob, he said when we were introduced) down the red carpet, stop when Bob stops, and pivot 90 degrees to the left to face our audience. Whitney guided me beautifully, and as the audience cheered, I gave Bob a nudge.

“It all feels a little odd, doesn’t it?” I whispered. Bob agreed. He’s a leader in immunization research at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, and he’s working now on HIV prevention research at the CDC and serves on the World Health Organization’s HIV Vaccine Advisory Committee. I’m guessing he’s won an award or two before. “The organizers are all taking it so seriously, though,” he whispered back. “You don’t want to disappoint them.”

And you know what? We didn’t. The event was well-organized, the room was full of positive energy and pride, we kept our talks relatively short, and everyone enjoyed the assortment of chocolate covered strawberries, brownies and cookies — especially Floey’s five-year-old little brother Ray, the youngest person there.

Hearing my brother Doug play at Fitzgerald’s was a perfect way to celebrate afterwards, and the alarm rang way too soon the next morning: all of the Dukes of Distinction had to be back at York at 7:30 a.m. to spend the day visiting classes. An entourage of high-energy well-organized students whisked us from one twenty -minute visit to the next, and after a while, I lost track of how many there were in all. I do know we visited:

  • a gym class (they were doing yoga!)
  • an animal behavior class
  • a creative writing class
  • a children’s literature class
  • a calculus class
  • the student newspaper staff
  • three different sophomore English classes
  • A concert band rehearsal
  • and a partridge in a pear tree.

My sisters Cheryl, Marilee and Bev came along with Whitney and me to all these classes, and all four of us were surprised at how much we enjoyed the calculus class. Leslie Davis Stipe (a friend from my York High School days) teaches that class, and she explained that it’s a “flipped classroom.” She makes videos explaining how to do calculations, students watch the video on their smartphones, home computers or at lunch in their high school’s high-tech Commons, and they can repeat the video as many times as necessary to help them understand. They return the next day to do what we used to call “homework” together in class. When we arrived, Leslie was circulating around the class while the students worked in small groups to do their exercises. It was great to see technology being used to make the most of a real-life teacher’s ability instead of trying to substitute for human interaction. Some other highlights:

  • The sophomore English students were all reading short stories and studying “identity.” One student asked if I thought my identity changed after I lost my sight. Another wanted to know if my sense of beauty changed, too.
  • The boys and girls cross country teams were heading to state championships in Peoria this weekend, and the band was coming along to play and cheer them on. When I told the band kids how much I used to love those bus trips, and that a lot always happened in the back of the bus, they laughed in agreement. It was reassuring to know some things really don’t change.
  • A creative writing student asked if it was hard for me to write without being able to see. “I don’t mean physically typing,” he said. “I mean, is it hard to describe things to readers?”
  • When the journalism teacher asked if anyone had one last question, a boy said he did. “Is it just me, or is that the most beautiful dog anyone has ever seen?”

Late in the day I had a one-on-one talk with a 16-year-old student who is losing her sight due to Stargardt’s disease. She seemed relieved when I told her I know what that is. I understood. “It’s nice to not have to explain that stuff all the time, isn’t it?”

We shared stories about friends who stick with us, and how difficult it is to learn Braille. She told me she might be going on a college visit early next year — it’s being arranged especially for high school students with visual impairments. They’ll go as a group to a number of colleges in the Chicago area. Each trip will include a talk by someone in the students with disabilities office.

By the end of our visit, she and I decided we’d try to arrange a presentation both of us could do together sometime. I’ll do my normal shtick, and she can demonstrate some of the new technology she uses to keep up with sighted friends her age.

York’s principal, Diana Smith, caught up with me at the end of the day and said she’d already heard from that student. “She told me visiting with you was the best thing that’s happened to her in high school.” If any of you blog readers are interested in having this 16-year-old and me come speak at your school, civic group, library, whatever, please leave your contact info in the comments here.

When 3:30 finally came around yesterday I was totally exhausted. I’ve said it before, but it’s worth repeating: teachers should be paid wayyyyyyyy more than they are now. Everyone should visit their old high school, too. I can’t promise you’d be given the royal treatment that I was (I was treated more like a Queen than a Duke) but boy, is it worth the trip.