During school presentations, I show schoolkids how I read Braille. I tell them how I listen to books on tape. I explain how a talking computer works and describe the way I use a screen-reader to read email messages and check out newspaper articles online. The kids learn I can’t read print. So when teachers […]

You read this blog. So you already know. I’m a shameless self-promoter. And now, sound the trumpets, ta-da, I’m taking the shameless art of self-promotion to a new level. On this day, in this post, I am promoting an article my children’s book publisher wrote about my skills at, you guessed it: shameless self-promotion!   […]

I brought my White Sox cap with me to the conference Hanni and I went to in Austin this week. I wanted everyone there to know we were from Chicago. It’s a strange and wonderful feeling to come “out” as a proud Chicagoan. And what an odd sensation to have national columnists take note of […]

Over 300 kids gathered in Nelson Elementary School’s gymnasium Thursday morning to hear me give a talk about my blindness, my children’s book and my bond with my Seeing Eye dog. Okay. That’s a lie. The reason they came had nothing to do with me. They were there to see Hanni! A second group of […]

  I called my great-niece while Mike and I were standing in line last night. Anita is 13 years old. Her father is from Jamaica. Her mother (my blonde-haired, blue-eyed niece Janet) raised Anita on her own. “Remember the part of that video Obama showed at the convention?” I asked Anita. “You know, where his […]