Whitney and I just got back last night from a web design conference in Dallas — my friend Sharron Rush gave the opening keynote yesterday, and when I heard she’d worked with Google to come up with a way to award conference scholarships to people with disabilities who wanted to attend, I went ahead and applied. And won!

Sharron co-authored a book called Maximum Accessibility: Making Your Web Site More Usable for Everyone. She is director and co-founder of Knowbility, a non-profit in Austin that helps make the internet and other technologies accessible to people who are blind, visually impaired, hearing impaired, have mobility impairments and cognitive or learning disabilities. Sharron’s keynote, “The Big Umbrella of Inclusive Design,” was described in the the Big Design web site like this:

Lessons learned – and those that we are still learning – have profound impact on design effectiveness and flexibility. As we design systems for inclusion, we find that as we remove perceived barriers we also solve unanticipated problems and improve user experience for all.

Google contacted Sharron a few months ago to tell her they were pleased to see her on the program, but were disappointed the conference wasn’t focusing even more on accessibility for those of us with disabilities. Sharron brainstormed with Google, and together they came up with this scholarship idea to make the conference more affordable for people who have disabilities. I was one of a handful of Google scholars to attend, and I sure appreciated the opportunity to talk with designers there about what a difference Accessible websites have made in my life.

Thanks to the efforts of programmers and website developers who value the importance of accessibility for the blind, speech synthesis allows me to Google to do my research, I’m able to fill out online forms on my own, I flip through websites to find information about events, times, locations and on and on. All that stuff the rest of you do using your eyes and a mouse? I do that by using my ears and keyboard commands.

We Google scholars all had lunch together with the folks from Knowbility after Sharron’s presentation, and it was heartening to be around so many people with an active interest in keeping the web accessible.

One huge bonus: A young man named Jason Hester from Knowbility sat next to me at lunch. Jason is able-bodied, and when I asked what got him interested in this sort of work, he credited a favorite professor at Texas State. I knew immediately who he was talking about. Professor Neill Hadder was in my group at the Seeing Eye last December. Neill was training with his new German Shepherd Bill while I was training with Whitney!

When you’re born blind, Braille isn’t the only thing you need to learn to be able to read. Children born blind have a harder time comprehending visual words than their sighted peers. So in addition to learning Braille, they also have to memorize the meaning of things they’ll never be able to see.

Take a sentence like this:

The sun peeked out on the horizon through a misty haze over the vast azure and charcoal marbled sea.

Let’s start with “peeked.” Or “horizon.” Try explaining a horizon to someone who has never seen one. Then there is “misty” and “haze” and “azure and charcoal” and even “marbled.” When a person has no point of reference, those words become white noise. The reader loses interest. The story becomes hard to follow.

That’s the handsome and gregarious young Alan Brint.

The work that goes into deciphering sentences like that is just one of many, many topics I discussed a couple of weeks ago during an interview in the studios at Chicago Public Radio with Alan Brint and his father David. Alan was born blind, but other than that he has everything in common with any other 15-year-old boy I’ve ever met: he’s a smart-aleck and a goofball, and he made me laugh. A lot. Unless WBEZ producers decide to edit it out, you’ll be hearing me snort laughing more than once during the interview.

Alan has a sweet side, too. He was tongue-tied when WBEZ project manager Aurora Aguilar told him how handsome he is. “I take that as a compliment,” he finally managed to eek out. You didn’t need to be able to see to know Alan was blushing.

Alan is about to finish his freshman year of high school, and in the interview he credits the itinerant teachers of the visually impaired (or, TVIs) who have been with him since pre-school for helping him build a visual vocabulary that now helps him pass honors physics and Shakespeare at Highland Park High. In addition to teaching spelling, writing, vocabulary and reading skills in Braille, TVIs spend oodles and oodles of time dissecting sentences for students — all in an effort to build up their visual vocabulary and their reading comprehension.

Students can’t always understand the visual concepts described for them, but the TVIs I talked to while researching this story told me they’re pleased to hear their blind students using these visual words anyway. Just like all the other kids, they want to talk about the same things as their peers. In some ways, it’s similar to learning a foreign language, using visual words, and hearing them used, helps with language retention. Family members are extremely important, too, when it comes to helping a child who is born blind build up a visual vocabulary, but God forbid a 15-year-old give his parents and siblings any credit. Especially with his dad and sister Carly sitting right there in the studio with us!

My loyal blog readers might recall a post I wrote here in March after WBEZ let me know they wouldn’t be airing pre-recorded essays like the ones I used to do for them. I met with Sally Eisele, Managing Editor of Public Affairs for WBEZ, after she sent that note, and she encouraged me to pitch story ideas for some of the topics they’d be covering in-depth. This piece about congenital blindness and literacy is the result of an idea I pitched when I heard WBEZ was going to devote a series to literacy issues. I researched the story for weeks, talked to dozens of teachers and parents, and then to both children and adults who were born blind. Two weeks ago we recorded more than an hour’s worth of conversation about all this, and my guess is the finished story will be about three minutes long. I’m eager to see (okay, hear) what makes it past the cutting room floor. WBEZ has hinted the piece will air this week, but I don’t have any more specifics than that. As we say in the biz: stay tuned!

Both of the memoir-writing classes I teach are taking time off in June, and one of the last topics I assigned before the break was this: choose a photograph, any photograph, and describe it to me in 500 words or less. “But please don’t say, well, this is a woman in a yellow skirt with a blue blouse standing in front of a doorway,” I said, asking them to consider telling their readers what happened right before the photo was taken, or the reason someone thought to take the photo in the first place. If they decided on a landscape, I suggested they could write about the significance of that building or mountain or whatever.

I don’t usually do the assignments I give my seniors, but when Ellen Sandmeyer emailed this photo from the Sandmeyer’s Bookstore 30th anniversary party last week, I decided to give it a try. While I may be unable to see the photo, I can guess what it might look like. After all, I was there when it was taken! Here’s the photograph:

Whit’s down there, you just can’t see her.

This is me on stage at the Jazz Showcase in Chicago. A gorgeous two-year-old copper-colored Golden Retriever/Labrador cross named Whitney is at my feet, and Charlie Parker has my back.

I’m looking just as stunning as I wanna be, adorned in my belted black Lana Turner shirtwaist dress. The sleeves are turned up to three-quarter length, and the top feels like a man’s classic button down shirt. After that, it’s all woman. The waist is cinched under a fabric belt, and pleats end up draping the skirt right at my knees. From what I’ve been told, this dress picks up light and shines any time I move – oo la la!

If I look happy in this photo, well, that’s because I have a lot to smile about. Earlier that afternoon I’d been surrounded by a dozen-plus of Chicago’s most talented writers, and after that senior-citizen memoir-writing class was over I’d rushed home, gobbled down lunch, grabbed a cab to the Chicago Public Radio studio on Navy Pier, recorded an interview (more on that in a future post), rushed home again, fed Whitney, changed clothes, and after following my clever and courageous dog’s lead down the street to Jazz Showcase, we arrived just in time to be escorted onto the stage to do my thing.

Brent Sandmeyer took this photo from across the bar – he and his brother Rolf had flown in from opposite sides of the country to celebrate their parents and the sensational bookstore they opened here in Printer’s Row 30 years ago. It was an honor and a thrill to be one of the handful of writers and publishers Ulrich and Ellen Sandmeyer chose to speak at their celebration, and while I could have gone on and on about Sandmeyer’s Bookstore, I kept my talk uncharacteristically short: I’d promised myself I wouldn’t have a glass of wine until my talk was over. Cheers!

ItalianHandfull left a commentto my previous post saying how touched she was to get an “inside-out” look at a presentation for elementary school kids. That comment inspired me to share this

That’s Erica with me and Whit.

additional point of view from the teacher who arranged our visit to Long Island in the first place.

Erica Bohrer teaches at Daniel Street School in Lindenhurst, NY. Her Erica Bohrer’s First Grade blog shares her secrets for success, and Whitney and I are still beaming after reading the post she published about our visit:

Oh, Whitney! That beautiful, happy, dog stole the show. When I first greeted Beth in the main office to escort her to the small gym, I noticed Whitney looking at me and wagging her tail. Hanni was always all business while wearing her harness. It was so hard for me not to reach down and pet Whitney, but I reminded myself that you don’t pet a service dog while he/she is working.

Good girl, Erica! Ms. Bohrer was a great role model for her students, restraining herself from petting Whitney until the end of the presentation, when I took Whit’s harness off and all the first-graders joined in on the fun.

Erica Bohrer’s post about our visit was extremely flattering, and it was interesting to discover another point of view on Whitney’s goofy behavior :

I guided Beth and Whitney down the hall to the small gym. Inside, the students were seated nicely awaiting Beth’s arrival. Whitney must have been distracted by all the children, because she almost led Beth into the door divider. I intervened, and just as I did, Whitney managed to lick a student’s face! Whitney is no Hanni! Beth informed me that Whitney loves children and that was one thing that would make her lose her focus. Beth did not seem concerned, apparently there is a learning curve for new seeing-eye dogs. Darn, I was ready to say, “you know if Whitney does not work out, I will take her.” Throughout the question and answer session, Whitney rolled on her back with her harness on, chewed on her

The first-graders followed all the rules while Whit was in harness.

leash, and was just hamming it up for the kids. Beth managed to get Whitney back on track, though I think the students preferred her goofball antics.

To read more — and see lots of photos! — I highly encourage you to link to the Erica Bohrer’s First Grade blog. My blog readers who are teachers will find Erica’s blog full of tips and ideas to help your kids learn, and you’ll be taking your advice from an excerpt: Erica Bohrer is the author of 50 Just Right Reading Response Activities and Super Spelling Centers, both published by Scholastic.

Kids from Daniel Street School in Lindenhurst, NY.

The first question during the Q&A part of our presentation at Daniel Street School last Monday wasn’t a question at all. “I have an opinion,” the 8-year-old declared.

What? He didn’t think it was fair to make sweet dogs like Whitney work? He thought all dogs should be allowed on planes, not just service dogs? Maybe a solid -colored blouse would have paired better with my outfit than this busy thing I’d chosen?

I quickly thought through some potential responses, then gave him the go-ahead. “Let’s hear it,” I said, taking in a big breath to ready myself.

”I like your dogdowag!” he exclaimed. I had to laugh. Who wouldn’t like Whitney? She had demonstrated her appreciation for this, her first trip to Long Island, before our presentation even started. As the first and second graders gathered in the gym, she flipped over on her back (not easy to do with a harness on) and kicked her legs in glee. She sat still for most of the presentation, but would periodically pirouette. Chew on her leash. Roll on her back. No surprise that a first grader raised his hand later to ask, “How do you keep your dog calm?”

My previous Seeing Eye dogs – Dora, Hanni and Harper – were stars at sitting still underfoot. Whitney, on the other hand, is a star at urban guiding, and for this I am very grateful. But like most city-dwellers, Whitney can’t sit still for long.

”Whitney and I are still getting to know each other,” I said, acknowledging I am not sure yet what works best when I need her to calm down. I’d been sitting in a folding chair while all this was going on, so my first step was simply to stand up and shake the leash a bit. Whitney turned over and stood up, too. “How about I show you what I do when I want her to get me out of a room?”

“Whitney, outside!” She led me past dozens of spellbound first and second graders to a door to the hallway. “Good girl, Whitney!” The kids cheered. We turned around to go back, but before sitting down again, I put Whitney through her daily obedience ritual in front of the kids.

• ”Whitney, sit!” She sat.
• ”Whitney, down!” She plopped to the floor.
• ”Whitney, sit!” She sat back up.
• ”Whitney, heel!” I walked a few steps, Whitney walked alongside me.
• I walked backwards then, and commanded, ”Whitney, come!” She looped around behind me and sat at my side.
• ”Whitney, rest!” I put my palm in front of her nose for a second, then stepped back a few steps. Whitney stayed right where she was until I returned to her side.

“Good girl, Whitney!” She stayed calm for the rest of the presentation. Francine Rich, my award-winning publisher at Blue Marlin Publications, had picked Whitney and me up to deliver us to the school, and she stayed all morning to help with navigation and book signings. Our Urbana friend Sunny moved to Long Island a year-and-a-half ago and generously offered to pick Whitney and me up after our presentation and drive us to the airport. We had some time before our flight, so Sunny wisely suggested we stop along the way at a state park that had a fenced-in tennis court.

The Seeing Eye discourages us from letting our dogs run free in open parks or fields. Sounds cruel to some dog lovers, but just think about it: without being able to see, we can’t keep an eye on them. If a baseball field or a tennis court is totally enclosed, however, we can turn our Seeing Eye dogs loose and let them run. And that’s exactly what Whitney did. After taking some time to smell the length of the fence, she ran. I called her, she raced back towards Sunny and me, then took off again. Run away, dash back. Away and back. Away and back. Away and back.

Our flight home was delayed, and a worn-out Whitney slept underfoot while I sat at the gate noshing on a breakfast bagel sweet Francine had bought for me that morning. A couple approached to say hello and ask about Whitney. “How old is your dog?” When I told them she was only two, they were amazed. “She’s so calm!”