Our school hired a new art teacher. As I'm heading the arts department, he's under my wing, so to speak, which is a little weird given he's in his 50's at least. Anyway, he's a nice guy.
I found him quite amusing for the first couple of weeks because he's basically computer illiterate to the max degree. He couldn't edit an excel file. He tried for hours, sought me for help. I pressed the big yellow 'Enable editing' button and we both went on with our day. That's the level we're talking here. And to be honest, I commended him in my head. Getting to 2023 without a computer invading every corner of your world is something I certainly envy.
To be clear he's not ancient grandfather levels of old. He's grey but he could probably run a marathon and looks sharp in a suit. So it just comes across as amusing that I'm having to babysit every single click of a mouse each day. I get some little insights to his life here and there. He lives near the campus, he comes to work over an hour early each day to get work done, he works when he gets home, and sleeps very little. Keep these in mind.
As the days went by and the struggles continued, thing took a bit of a sadder turn. He clearly felt too embarrassed at this point to keep asking me things only for me to reveal the most utterly simple solutions every time.
So he confessed to me what was going on, pleading not to tell the school.
Let me remind you that he's the art teacher. It turns out, a big reason he struggles so much is because he's half blind. Specifically, a condition called hemianopsia which he described as looking like this:
So when he couldn't see the 'enable edit' button, it simply wasn't in his field of vision. When he couldn't figure out how to save a file, it's because he couldn't even see that in the top left of the screen.
He comes to work early, continues at night and sleeps little because he has to keep up with the regular working pace otherwise he'll drown.
Now, I looked the condition up and apparently it's most common as a result of a stroke, it may be permanent or temporary. But the way he talks and behaves makes me think he's had it a lot longer, perhaps for life.
It's not my business I suppose and as long as he's willing to overwork himself to keep up and can still do his job, I've no reason to snitch to authorities (not that I ever would anyway given how much of a decline I've seen myself drop as I get increasingly jaded every passing day), but I do feel a new aura of sadness around him suddenly.
I mean he's a cheery guy but it must surely be a fa莽ade. This is a French guy, single, old, in China, half blind and possibly dyslexic, teaching art which adds constant pressure on a disability specific crippling vision-based things.
I mean, it's commendable as much as it is sad. I spent an hour or so looking for options and software that I could maybe share and help him out with workflow, but accessibility options on Windows doesn't really account for left-side blindness specifically. There's ways to deal with it but it seems he's very overwhelmed with technology already with the work bureaucracy etc.
I tried to teach him a 2-button command (Windows and +/- buttons) and he couldn't hack it, said it would be something he needed to study at home. So, just the simple idea of telling him he can snap a window to the right side of the window seems like a faraway goal.
Damn, I read more and found that most people who get a stroke get some kind of vision loss. That's quite terrifying to me, especially now I'm imagining seeing the world through his eyes, where his left hand typing might not even be visible right in front of him.
I've been worrying an increasing amount about my health generally, and my ears being my career tools getting more tinnitus than before, it feels like I'm heading the same direction as him. I doubt I would be as strong as him to pursue music as a career if I became half deaf.
Again, he's commendable for his accomplishments all things considered.
It's certainly a reminder not to get a stroke or a brain tumour. Not much I can do about the latter, and strokes can hit anyone randomly, too. But certain lifestyles exacerbate those risks and since I'm getting increasingly conscious of them lately with my cracking joints, back pain, tinnitus, rotten toe and that mysterious painful lump on my neck that came and went, I might as well use this guy as inspiration to work even harder at unclogging my arteries.
Fun Fact: 1 in 2 people get cancer. 50% of all humans get cancer! Granted, most are at an elderly age but even so, that's a monstrous statistic.
Well, I'll leave you with that. Take care of yourselves, and don't let obstacles get in the way of your ambitions.