Free Write on Blindness

Prompt: If you were told by a doctor that you were going to go blind in the general near-future, what are some things you would try to do before that happened?

I'm honestly not sure of what I would do, because given the limited time frame, I'd have to rank things by what I felt was more important than others. But I know what I would want to do. I would want to take time to spend alone with each and every person I care about. I would want to etch their face, their smile, their visual selves into my mind. People's appearances are always changing, and memories are always tenuous at best, so I suppose etching them into my mind isn't what I'd really want to do. I'd want to take that time and appreciate what I can see, appreciate what they look like, every inch of them, because I will not be able to appreciate that again later.

I would want to wander the places I've called home, wander through them and look at everything, both what is near and familiar to me and what I am noticing for the first time.

I would take my friends that know of such things and see as much visual artwork as I could. The greats and the famous, to be sure, but also the little things. Lizzey's drawings and paintings, Izzy's various creations, my brother's little sketches, my own scribbles from when I was young.

With time running out, I would try to appreciate everything that I could one last time. Not for the memories, but for the worth in appreciating things that will someday be lost to us.