Monday, September 27, 2010

What if you were blind?

If you were blind, would you still care about wearing brand name clothes and putting mascara on every day?  How much time each day do we spend on primping (ourselves, our houses, our cars, our children, etc.) with the INTENT of fitting in (or standing out) with society's standards?  Do you think it's important to put on make up and iron your shirt? Yah, yah, you can "say" you do it to make YOURself feel better... but is that really the reason? If you were blind, would you still do these things to make yourself feel better?  I wonder.

Also, if you're a writer, have you ever thought about how your book will be received by a blind person? Yes. Silly. They do read! Books are a great pleasure for the blind, just as they are for the sighted. My son has finally found a love for books. He's visually impaired. But, now he's listening to books through the Talking Book Service.

http://libraries.idaho.gov/landing/talking-book-service

And... I've been thinking about visual impairments a LOT lately.  Today, I read a blog post over on Lisa and Laura Write about line edits. They said their characters repeat a lot of the same actions in their writing. And, so then I wondered, how would my descriptions be received by a blind person? Do I describe the setting and the actions with enough detail to paint a vivid picture for the blind? Should that even be a consideration? Because, don't we want to paint the most vivid pictures for ANYone and EVERYone?

Of course! But, none-the-less... it makes me stop and wonder. During my next revision session, I'm going to imagine the story being read out loud to a blind person and see if my writing is good enough.

What do you think? Am I just a crazy person? Or do you think we spend too much time as a society on primping when we could be doing something more worthwhile with our time? Have you ever considered how your writing will be received by a blind person?

3 comments:

  1. Hm...very interesting thoughts here! I do think we spend too much time focused on how we look to others. And as for the writing end, I like the idea of reading the story out loud. Thanks for sharing!

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  2. THis is an exceelent point, Margo! I have actually wondered how the blind perceive the world... many times. I haven't considered it with my writing, but what a great way to help set the scene!

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  3. Thanks Shallee and PK for commenting! :)

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