I’m Back

I’ve been accused a couple of times of authoring a blog so I could bitch and moan. Admittedly, there have been times when I’ve had to work through a topic or pain. Working through a topic allows me to find language to hopefully, ultimately say something useful about a subject. Working thorough pain is sometimes a necessary step that all of us face occasionally. Being accused of bitching and moaning a couple of times this year has caused me to rethink the blog and the messaging. During my introspection I’ve come to the conclusion that with many other things bitching and moaning is contextually defined by culture. When I look, figuratively, around me in the world and listen to people its easy to interpret what many people are saying as, “bitching and moaning”. When a person of advanced age is verbalizing their plight or a young person is complaining they have to go pee or they’re hungry it sounds like complaining or bitching and moaning. When a person who is of a different gender is complaining about a gender focused experience, a woman having her period, or a man complaining about his erectile dysfunction, can all be interpreted as complaining or bitching and moaning. I’ve concluded that yes occasionally I’ve a diva bitch from hell and I’m complaining, but excuse or not I’m human. How much do you complain? However as a blind person expressing verbally the things I feel about being blind, or my particular plight , could from a sighed persons perspective be interpreted as bitching and moaning. Yes there are times when I should, shout up and suck it up buttercup, but as with each of us there are times when I’m trying to verbalize how I feel about things and at times I am expressing how I feel about being blind.
Life has provided much pain over the past few years being forcibly separated from my children be they biological or inherited due to relationships has been very hard on me. I am the one who wanted ten kids and a hundred grand kids. Having no children in my house was unimaginable. Children used in the context of others controlling coercing or using them to try and hurt you is totally diabolical. I hope and pray my children will find their way out of the insanity they now find themselves in. As for me as with the decision to get divorced in the first place I am choosing life. I may be moving on from the issue and the intended hurt from others but I remain constant, I am here for my children, be they my biological children or those I’ve encountered in my journey. The only people that will ultimately be hurt are those actively manipulating, poisoning my children, I have faith that through the journey of life my children will ultimately find their way home.
Work has continued to be eventful. I stopped publishing for a time when an employer of mine told me that the blog is “embarrassing”. During my short employ I came to realize it wasn’t only the blog but I that was embarrassing. This former employer continued to say I had to edit the content of the blog to become acceptable. The implication was my loss of employment if I didn’t edit the blog. As you can see I chose to be embarrassing and fired the employer. The employer, a small man with a small mind, never could express what was an acceptable level of being disabled or writing about disability. It ultimately wasn’t worth my effort to hang around and find out the hard way how far my limits of being embarrassing stretched. So again I’ve had to find a new job.
I have to chuckle a bit. A long time colleague of mine won’t considering hiring me because I’ve had a few short term employment gigs this year. Funny thing is that each one of those gigs was, “short” due to people’s short sightedness. Blind people are incompetent, blind people don’t need quality technology to work, blind people an’t competent, blind people are embarrassing, blind people that are audacious enough to say something about being blind are nothing short of trouble. Whenever you leave a job its important to have a leaving story, a reason why you left that job and are now interviewing for a new one. My stories this year are the most amazing ones I’ve ever had.
Joyfully, after a long exile I returned to Toronto recently, was very nice to visit an old home. I still feel very acceptable there, very much considered included into the stewing pot of diversity and culture which is Toronto. I still miss living there and it was wonderful to see some old friends and visit the church I once frequented. While there I had the opportunity to take my wife to “Lee’s Lounge” one of the most sensual culinary experiences I’ve ever had. I’ll write more about it but at the end of the evening I had to cry I was so overwhelmed with the experience.
In my journey this past fall I met someone who independently is a reader of the words I post, and in reading those words used them to help others. It’s not often I’m speechless, the trick is getting me to shut up, but I was speechless. I remain in awe that fate has decided to show me a direct example of the impact these few words have had for others. I often don’t know what to say to my new friend, my reader. As we’ve both discovered its not often you get to meet the person you’ve read or the person that has read you, profound.
Finally, “Being careful what you wish for”. I have a new job with some old colleagues who knew from Microsoft, these people know I am blind, and have been historically some of the best advocates I’ve ever had. When I was called by a recruiter asking me to consider a role with this team, initially I was sure, yeah, whatever. As I did my research in preparation for the interview and found out who the leadership team was, I knew I’d professionally found my way back home. I was probably the most successful I’ve been in my career the last time I worked with this team. I won the Bill Gates Global Services Award and almost doubled my salary in bonuses. I haven’t fully rocked the world yet but it’s coming. I’m still getting my feet wet and I’m, I’m embarrassed to admit – overwhelmed with opportunities to work. I’m embarrassed because of my boastfulness after spending the time I did at Microsoft I was sure there would never be a job to challenge me to that level again, I was wrong. Work life balance is still being established but equilibrium will return and I will be writing again.