Stolen Sight

Because I didn’t return to the religion fully, a deeper punishment came—a curse that harkened back to my childhood initiation into Santeria. “Your son is on the verge of losing his sight . . .” I remembered Cookie telling my mother when I was just ten years old. Now the old curse had come to claim me because of my disobedience to the spirits. Out of the clear blue the retinas of both eyes began to detach. To correct this, I had one operation after the other—a total of seven—but to no avail. I was completely blind. It is one thing to be born blind but quite another to lose your sight after seeing the sky, the birds, the faces of family, friends, and even those you hate.

What had life done to me now? After thirty years of seeing everything I wanted to see, now I couldn’t even see my own hand in front of my face. Was God punishing me? Or testing me? Why would I be able to see for thirty years and suddenly not see at all? Each blind person’s experience is unique. For me, it was like a grayish mist came down over my vision, or like a cloudy day sitting on top of my eyes. What an experience. I learned to depend on my hearing and touching through my hands.

The funniest things, the small things that didn’t matter, or the things you never took notice of, you suddenly crave when you’re blind, and those thoughts constantly run through your mind. Life is gray and not by choice. It’s like a whole different dimension where your world closes in. It’s like living in your world with no visitors. What was important at one time doesn’t matter anymore. Emptiness and sorrow become your friends.

The doctors told me I had two choices: a seeing-eye dog or a cane to maneuver myself around

with.

That’s when my mother decided it was time for me to move back closer to her. By now I lived

on the twelfth floor in her building and she lived on the second. But with the new arrangement, I stayed in her apartment. She knew about the crazy religion I had been involved in, but she wasn’t afraid of my demons. I was her son, and she was going to take good care of me.

My world came to a stop. Losing it all, losing my vision, I lay in one of the back rooms of her apartment, with a treatment of eye drops every four hours. From somewhere in the apartment I could hear a clock ticking, counting off the seconds of my new life—seconds that seemed to stretch into an eternity of nothingness. Doctor’s orders required that I lie twelve hours in bed on my back and twelve hours on my stomach after squeezing the prescription drops into my eyes: twelve hours face-up and twelve hours face-down. The only time I was allowed to get up was to go to the bathroom, shower, or eat. This regimen went on for six months—I was unable to sit up, unable to go outside. It took a toll on me mentally, and as I lay in bed I recapped the good times I spent in the clubs.

“Mom!” I would yell out from my bed. “What time is it?”

And she would answer back, calling out the time. If it was 11:30 p.m., I would recall dancing the night away with beautiful women, or drawing a soul into my dark religion through a reading in a smoke-filled room. Remembering the past and how I went about my daily and nightly activities kept my mind from cracking.

At my next appointment two weeks later, the doctor took me into an examination room and looked into the retina of my right eye. My vision wasn’t getting any better, which meant it was time for drastic measures.

The doctor turned to me and whispered, “Today we’re going to do a procedure that will be one of the most difficult you ever experience. We will not use anesthesia for this one.”

As he got up, I looked the doctor straight in his eyes and said, “Do whatever you have to do, it’s fine with me,” not realizing what was about to take place.

The doctor reached out for one of the longest needles I had ever seen. The thing must have been about six or seven inches long. As he came back and sat down, he said to me, “You must be still and grip the chair with both of your hands and look toward me. Don’t even blink your eye. I’m going to insert this needle straight into your pupil so it can hit the back of your eye behind the retina and form an air pocket. That will allow your retina to heal faster.”

When he stuck the needle through my eye, I gripped the chair with all my might and felt my blood run cold. I was not able to move or blink as he kept pushing the needle deeper into my eye.

But no matter what the doctors did, the disappointment in my mother’s voice painted a picture I didn’t want to see. I would be this way for a long time to come.

During my follow-up appointment I got more bad news. I already knew I had low vision, but now the doctor used a term that made my stomach feel like a bag full of rocks—legally blind.

In late fall of that year, I met with a counselor from the Commission of the Blind for my interview, and my case was accepted. From there, I was evaluated and placed into a program tailor- made just for me while counselors monitored my progress. I would learn to do all the things blind people do in order to survive.

One morning after almost a year without normal vision, I got up and felt something strange in my eyes. A tiny bit of light shone through.

“Mom, come quick!” I called from the back room of the apartment. “What is it, John,” my mother said as she came through the door.

I held up my hand and waved it back and forth in front of my eyes. A glimmer of light from the window created enough illumination for me to see the movement, slight though it was.

“John, are you saying . . .” Her words dropped off, and her voice caught in her throat. “I can see.”

I was allowed to go out regularly under supervision, and in time my vision returned fully. I shared my experience with members of the religion, and soon after I returned to witchcraft with a new devotion. How I thanked my fellow witches and warlocks for praying for me, and for all the spirits for helping me in my time of need. My gratefulness propelled me full force into the dark side, serving the devil and casting spells on those who got in my way. I also remained faithful in luring new recruits from bars, clubs, lounges—wherever I could find them. I would prey on people by telling them their fortune and then destroy them.

Date: 2015-01-11; view: 814