The following application essay demonstrates once again that National Conventions profoundly affect many, many people, not all of them blind. But, when the fireworks go off each year, I am usually sitting by the pool of first-class hotel in a big city, surrounded by hundreds of blind people. That may seem strange to some, but I would never wish to be anywhere else. I guide people to their hotel rooms, help them find the registration line, and basically make myself useful. The most meaningful thing I do by far is working at NFB child care.
Child care is a service for children whose parents are attending the convention.
Some of the children are blind, and some are the sighted children of blind parents. One of the main things I have learned helping at child care is just how much potential disabled children truly have if you help them reach it. The first day of child care last summer I looked around and saw the sighted children playing happily together with the toys. But I was troubled to see that most of the blind or disabled children were playing alone in a corner or not playing at all, simply sitting or rocking back and forth. The sighted children made no attempt to reach out to them.