I have been blind for more than six years and there are certain things that interest and amuse me.  One of the facts that is of interest and amusement to me concerns tying my shoes.  Sighted people have no trouble in performing this service.  But non-sighted people have a bigger problem with tying their shoes.
It strikes me that trying to teach a non-sighted person how to tie a shoe would be a major undertaking.  There are bows to be made and knots to be made.  I have had 83 years of shoe tying.  But I will guarantee you that if I had become blind without having been able to tie a shoe, I would have opted for Velcro which does the job for you.
This is an essayette.  Specifically, I do not wish to call attention to my blindness for the sake of seeking pity.  But in this instance, I wish to call attention to the fact that tying a shoe would be most difficult.  If I had not been able to tie my own shoes from memory, I would say again that Velcro is the only answer.  Once again, I do not seek your pity.  But I am delighted to have learned how to tie my shoes before blindness overtook me.  I am glad that things happened in this order, first tying shoes and then blindness.  It would have been a disaster the other way around.  And so we have this essayette on shoe tying.   As time goes on, there may be other essayettes that I hope will enlighten your life.
 
E. E. CARR
August 5, 2011
Essay 584
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Kevin’s commentary: check out other short essays here. There are definitely some winners. I would have thought that tying one’s shoes by feel probably wouldn’t be the absolute worst thing to do while blind precisely because it is all tactile, but I can certainly understand why it would be unpleasant.