The blind girl who could see

Imagine you had perfect eyesight during the first ten years of your life. You saw butterflies and wildflowers. You saw all the colors of the rainbow. You saw the faces of all your loved ones. You even saw the face of the writer of this column, as he taught you in elementary school.

Then something happened. All the wonderful people and beautiful things you ever saw … you now would never see again.

I won’t go into detail about how Bridget became blind. That is not the purpose of this particular edition.

But I will tell you how it came to be that she could see.

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Bridget could have lived in darkness with her blindness. And for a while, she did exactly that. Who wouldn’t?

I cannot, for the life of me, imagine what it is like to become permanently blind. I have tried it … for a few seconds. But even for such a small window of time, the experience can be terrifying.

All of us are only a random accident or unusual sickness away from becoming blind ourselves. All of us. At virtually any time.

Yet how often do we truly appreciate our vision while we have it?

Yes, Bridget wallowed around a bit in her fate and misery for some time after becoming blind. Again, who wouldn’t?

Then Bridget began to search for things she could do to help others. Ah, that seems to be forever the “secret” to pulling out of depression. Helping others frees us up to not think so much about our own tragedies and misfortunes. I have found that it is, indeed, nearly impossible to sincerely help another person while simultaneously feeling deeply sorry about oneself.

By the time Bridget entered middle school, she began making handmade, homemade bracelets. She gave them to me to hand out to the students in my class.

She also volunteered to come to my class and speak with my students about living life with a disability.

Bridget became somewhat of a real-life “heroine” to virtually everyone I taught from that time onward until my retirement. I would estimate that around one thousand handmade “Bridget bracelets” were eventually handed out to my students.

Many times I got permission for Bridget to come to my classroom and hand them out herself. My school principals were always wonderfully accomodating and encouraging about allowing Bridget to visit my school and interact with my students. In the pic below she is allowing children to “see” what it is like to try to walk while blind.

Bridget also joined in on many of the extra-curricular acvities I did with my students. She came on our annual Halloween Haunted Hikes. This experience proved so enriching for my students because they were also “blind” as they walked with me through the Haunted Woods. I allowed no light at any time. We all saw what Bridget saw every day of her life. In fact, I allowed Bridget to lead several of these hikes with me, as she deftly taught the children how to safely navigate a forest by using senses other than their sight.

Bridget may not have the vision she once had, but her voice is like that of an angel’s. Each Christmas Season, as I took my students caroling around Bristol - to the jail, to nursing homes, to whoever may need it most - Bridget came along to lead us in our singing.

At Virginia High School, Bridget was Homecoming Queen her senior year. That fact speaks highly of both Bridget and the school’s student body - who overwhelmingly voted for her.

When the remnants of Hurricane Helene hit our region last September, Bridget immediately organized a fundraiser to aid the victims. She sold her jewelry at a local business, with one hundred per cent of the sales (not just profits, but the entire sale of each item) going to help those ravaged by the flooding.

How do I know for sure about this? That’s easy. Bridget gave me the rather considerable sum of money she raised and I personally took it over to Erwin and Asheville, making sure it went to specific places where it was most direly needed.

Bridget, like the rest of us, has hopes and dreams. The last I spoke with her she was thinking about attending a school for the blind in Richmond. She also sells her jewelry on her Facebook page at times, all of it hand-made by her. You can look her up on Facebook; Bridget Ashley, Bristol. When you send her a friend request, as I hope you will do, make sure you mention that her old teacher, Mr. Talley, sent you. (She has a special device that reads aloud to her what is written on her Facebook page.)

Word has it that Bridget Ashley can’t see. Don’t believe it, my friends.

Bridget can see. I dare say she sees more than many people I know who have twenty-twenty eyesight. When it comes to finding opportunities to do good things in this world, she has the vision of an eagle.