a memory

(I'm not sure what caused this to come back to me.)

Unbeknownst to me at the time, I spent my first two weeks or so of kindergarten in the "dumb" section. Then someone got the clue that a vision problem is not the same as a learning disability, and they moved me. Maybe they noticed that I already knew how to read, but that I was holding the books really close. (This was before the cataract surgery.)

For the first couple years of school, the books had giant-sized print. Then in, I think, second grade, the print got smaller and I told a teacher "I can't see this". Time passed, and then one day I was presented with large-print versions of my textbooks.

One day shortly after that, I was called out of class to meet Miss H. She was from the organization that sent the books, and from now on she would be spending one class period a week with me. There seemed to be no agenda at first; only later did I realize I was being assessed.

These visits were like manna from heaven. We solved puzzles. (Well, she presented and I solved. At that age I wouldn't have known an IQ test if it walked up and introduced itself.) We worked through the entire body of Encyclopedia Brown mysteries. We did the basics of algebra in, I think, fourth grade. In fifth grade she taught me to type (which was fortuitous in several ways). She taught me shorthand (you win some, you lose some :-) ). We played games. I think we diagrammed sentences (yay grammar). We did other stuff (some now forgotten). I had a blast.

Sometime in middle school I caught on: she was a tutor, and her job was to provide remedial education -- because obviously handicapped students would have trouble keeping up in classes. It was an institutional assumption, not hers, and institutional assumptions can be hard to challenge. But why challenge this one? After a visit or two she must have realized that I wasn't suffering from learning problems, but both of us thought this was the best hour of our respective school weeks. I don't know what she told her employers; I simply (and truthfully) told anyone who asked that I enjoyed the visits and was learning a lot.

There were no accommodations for above-average students when I was in school, but through a quirk of nature I got my own private gifted program until high school. By then my eyes had adapted enough that I could read normal-sized books -- not the tiny print that sometimes shows up, but for that I had started carrying a pocket magnifying glass (which I still do). The large-print books and the special visits ended with the move to high school. I was glad not to need the books, but sad not to get the visits.

I wonder whatever happened to Miss H. (I know she became Mrs. something-other-than-H, but aside from that.) I hope her memories of those years are half as fond as mine are.

not a good eye-care day

I got my last pair of glasses from NeoVision in Shadyside and was highly satisfied with the experience. It's time for a new pair (sort of), so a couple weeks ago I made an appointment with their office on the south side a block from work. (Appointment because this time, as last time, I was having them produce the prescription as well. I'm a big fan of one-stop care for this kind of thing, having in the past been caught between the glasses place and the doctor's office when the resulting glasses weren't right.)

The people at the new location today were really disorganized, and they didn't seem to grok customer care. The doctor (same guy as in the other location) is good, but the rest of my experience today was pretty poor, from the long wait before anyone even acknowledged my existence to losing my paperwork (and repeatedly failing to get my name right so they could retrieve it -- it's only six letters, for crying out loud) to pretty much abandoning me when it was time to actually choose frames. At each stage I thought I was five minutes away from success so I didn't walk out. I think they call this "being nibbled to death by ducks". :-)

Then I came home to find a letter from my ophthamologist's office. (Oh right, I thought; I owe them some money from my last visit. Must be that. Nope.) My doctor is leaving the practice. The practice is happy to offer their other fine doctors, they say; I've had personal experiences with two of them and judge them not-so-fine. So Monday morning I'll try to find out where my doctor is going. If I can't follow her, I don't feel particularly constrained by the current practice.

NeoVision's doctor is actually an ophthamologist (surprised me!), so on one hand he's a possibility. (I'd want to research him, of course.) I like him, which is a good start. However, it would mean dealing with his possibly-incompetent staff more than once every few years. Or I guess I could go to the Shadyside office; that could work. (Hours are limited.)

Funny, I expected to lose both my vet and my primary-care physician before I lost my ophthamologist. (VCA has trouble keeping good vets and the physician has got to be close to retirement by now.) I have hopes that I haven't really lost the ophthamologist; we'll see.