Up Close & Personal

Work in progress.

It's time to tell and explain more about me and my history, me and my world, and me and my family in the present.

I'm big and bold with the "group' and the benefits of the "group", however, this is all me and about me.

Why am I doing this; I'll tell you. It's more for you, however, it's slightly for me. I want to put into writing some content about me so that if anyone is interested in some of my history, for example, a relative, they would possibly be able to find this writing and read it to glean some family information. This is my writing home. Here is where I live when I am actively participating in writing and related activities. We're a family, a group of writers, readers, and reviewers and more. In order for us to know each other we must share information through writing. So, here I am writing about me.

Me, the person who goes by the handle dogpack. I chose dogpack because I've been around dogs all my life, studied how the pack interacts and survives, and am still sharing my life with a dog. Bella is my dedicated and devoted service dog.

In the beginning I was apparently in a hurry to enter this world. Six weeks early I appeared, was put into an incubator, and after spending many hours and days in this environment, my retinas became oxygen starved. My retinas did not properly develop, so I have vision loss and am considered legally blind. The reason I have some vision is because my mother regularly visited with me and this required removing my from the oxygenated environment. I have never known normal vision so the sight I have is normal to me. By setting the computer so that windows activates the magnification program built into it, I am able to make the font on the screen big. It isn't nearly as good as the software which requires you pay to be able to own it and use it but it is better than no computer access. I'm thrilled to be able to have use of a compluter so that I can do many tasks and have knowledge of things that would otherwise be unknown to me.

For many years from childhood until young adulthood and a slight bit beyond, I did the usual activities; except get a drivers license; I don't miss driving because I've never driven a vehicle like a car or van for instance. I don't know what it is to be able to drive. What I do know is, I have had to rely on the kindness of people to share their time with me, so that they could drive me places. The freedom of driving myself instead of having someone drive me I understood very well. I was different and because of this I was set apart from many opportunities. When events happened, I wanted to be able to go, no drivers license, no driver; I wasn't able to go. This is reality. Or I would be able to go but only when it was convenient for them to take me; more reality of life. Basically I'm content, easy going, and accepting of situations whenever possible. To be able to drive me when and wherever I would want to go would be wonderful. Tiz' not to be, so I'm creative and organized as much as possible so that when the opportunity for me to go somewhere is available, I have a plan, tell the driver what I want and need, and we set a time and then we're off cursing to our destinations.

Reading signs, menus, and other information posted for public knowledge or as a warning about something, most of the time is inaccessible to me. Going to a book store and picking a book or newspaper/magazine to read off the shelf is something I do differently. I get my books, magazines, newspapers, and other reading materials from the library for the blind and physically handicapped or similar places. If the font is 24 point font, years ago would have be fine for me to be able to read. After cataract surgery I need about 28 point or bigger font in order to read the written word in any format.

Dogs have been in my life since infancy. Along with dogs I have had many other animal friends. I think animals are wonderful beings and enjoy spending my time with them and sharing my life and what I can provide for their well being; they deserve as much and more from me because they give more to me than I can give to them.

Music is important to me. I enjoy many varieties of music such as; christian, folk, bluegrass, blues,etc. My job used to be spending the day tuning and repairing pianos.

Later in life I started collecting stuff. I didn't want to do this. Now where was I going with this statement????

I didn't volunteer for this. If God had not been a huge part of my life and I hadn't had a lot of support from people, I would have most likely been a mean, grumpy, despicable, horrible person who might have decided not to stay on earth. Because of my relationship with God, I decided to enjoy life, help people, and trust Him who sustains me. Here is why this could have happened.

In 1992 I was hit by a car, which was pulling out of a parking lot while I was traveling past; directly in front of them. It was rush hour traffic; I had to go past them in order to use the entrance of the parking lot. Where they were looking, I have no idea; except obviously they were not looking in the direction they were driving.

I still remember hitting the hood of the car and then being thrown down upon the asphalt. It took a moment or two to realize i was ok. I very carefully checked to see if everything worked and then got up to look at my bike. My bike was in apparently decent shape, however, I wanted to be certain of this. And, I was on my way to the bike shop so, continued in that direction. As I reached the drivers side of the car she said where'd you come from? I told her, we talked a moment and she waited for me to return from the bike shop because she wanted to know if everything was ok with me and the bike. Apparently all was fine.

The next morning, I woke up with back pain. In retrospect, I now realize that I should have gone to the hospital to be checked out, but When I was growing up, you toughed it our unless you were seriously sick or hurt. So, thinking I was fine, I didn't give my well being any further thought right after the accident. Now I realized I had a medical issue and so obtained an appointment with my doctor. Again, going to the hospital had not occurred to me. I wasn't able to get an appointment for a few weeks and by that time my back was really hurting. After getting x-rays, MRIs, and some other tests I was told about why my back was hurting so much.