Penn (00:00)
Hello everybody and welcome back to the blind chick. That's Moses Street
Moses (00:07)
And that's Penn Street. The.
Penn (00:17)
We're actually
pretty perky for this morning considering we've gone the last week from home. started out with the access, the 2026 Access and Functional Needs Annual Conference in Colorado Springs. We were there for what? Four days?
Moses (00:42)
That was fun. am, it's every time we go to Colorado Springs, I'm falling in love with it. In fact, if we didn't absolutely love our little cottage in the center of Old Town Loveland, it would...
Boy, I'd be thinking about Colorado Springs. ⁓ It's so pretty, so many things. And everybody thinks of it as military, but it is. Yeah, it is. ⁓
Penn (01:13)
Yeah.
Which it is,
but it's also the Olympic Sports Center, the ⁓ Paralympic Sports Center.
Moses (01:32)
Huge gay a huge gay population Yeah, and so that makes the downtown so much more fun than a regular downtown. You walk into a gay store and you are going to be entertained Typical
Penn (01:43)
You
No stereotypical. Yeah.
But the conference was great. Sadie Martinez, I know you're a fan of the podcast. You did a great job setting that up. And then we did take a little bit of time for ourselves. We went to the zoo and if you haven't been to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, it is a must. You get to pet giraffes. You can feed them too, but pet the giraffes.
Moses (02:20)
in the wallabies.
Penn (02:22)
and then I also got to pet ⁓ a baby wallaby. So I was in heaven. And then a cool thing, or to me it's really cool, is I went, ⁓ my prosthetic ocular specialist is in Colorado Springs. ⁓ Mitch Mayo, ⁓ I will give a, he's not paying me to say this either. ⁓ He is to me the best prosthetic, ⁓
artist in Colorado. mean, he's my only one, so I guess that's not really fair, but nothing but good things. anyway, I had not been to see him regarding my prosthetic eye. What did he say? had been two years? Yeah. And so he buffed it up and made it.
Moses (03:09)
least two years, yes.
Penn (03:15)
you know, whittled it down, it look pretty again. he said, ⁓ and it does feel much better, like it's crazy. ⁓ But he said that I take really good care of my prosthetic eye. He says, almost everybody comes in, their prosthetic eye is chipped or cracked or I'm like, how do you do that? And he goes, they drop them. And I was like, how do you drop your prosthetic eye? But I guess I'm weird.
Moses (03:45)
Maybe if you think about it.
Penn (03:48)
I don't think I've ever dropped my eye. I mean, I literally, I don't think I've
Moses (03:52)
dropped or chipped my eyes.
Penn (03:55)
That's good. That's good. That's good. Yeah. So he said I have about probably this one because they last around five years and I'm, I'm about at my five year with this one. So we'll, we'll have to go back down to Colorado Springs again. Most probably over the next six months. So I know you'll hate that, but
Moses (04:00)
Okay.
Yeah, no, I love it. And anybody who wants to email in, they can put anything on a prosthetic eye. Yeah, so you could put a star, you could put a word.
Penn (04:30)
And
A light. ⁓ There's a little girl, I need to look her up again, she's on social media. ⁓ And she's a huge fan, I want to say of Rihanna. I can't remember her favorite, it's not Taylor Swift, but whoever the artist is, is very blingy, like sparkly things. And so she wanted her prosthetic eye to be like her favorite artist. And so the...
And I don't know where she she's from, but that was really, they can. But Mitch has said he's put like the Bronco emblem on there and different sports things. like, no, no, I just want mine to try to match my other.
Moses (05:21)
So email in what you think Ben should put on her.
Penn (05:25)
Right eye. Yeah. Send that to feedback at aftersite.org. Or if you have a prosthetic eye and you've done something kind cool with it.
Moses (05:37)
Did you name it?
Penn (05:39)
no, you don't mean. I don't think that's a thing. But then we went from Colorado Springs to a small town out on the prairie, almost to Kansas, the old dust bowl to Lamar, Colorado. we ⁓ went to ⁓ the, official title is the MD-6.
Moses (05:50)
Yeah, the old dust bowl area.
Penn (06:03)
state lions convention, which means that's Colorado state lions convention. And that was really, that was, that was fun. It was so wonderful. And we ran into our, our biggest fan, Jim, Dr. Valenzuela from, from Pueblo. Jim, it's always, it's, yeah. We, we love talking to you and getting your feedback. You're, we, we love, love, love. ⁓
Moses (06:16)
Which is always so much fun.
Hey, Jim.
Penn (06:31)
And we gotta get you. We gotta get you on the blinds.
Moses (06:33)
has honest feedback because I asked him about, I'm not going to bring it up, ⁓ something about the podcast and he said, you gotta, I'm paraphrasing.
Penn (06:47)
We want that feedback.
Moses (06:50)
He said you guys we were screwing up on a thing and we needed to fix it so yep
Penn (06:56)
And
so, speaking of that, we're going to, we're going to get moving here. No, Jim, we love you. ⁓ we, he, Jim will be on a future blind check. stay, stay ready for that. So Moses, partially because of what some of the feedback we've gotten, we, we have a new, we're going to start, we're going to, today's the first day, but we're going to try a new thing is.
We have a deck of cards and do you have them ready? I got it. Okay. And on the cards are a bunch of different questions. And so we thought each week Moses would, what is it called when you shuffle? Shuffle the deck, shuffle the cards and we'll pick a question. And no, they're not in Braille or they're not in large print. Moses is going to pick one. Okay. Okay. And we're both going to answer it. So.
Moses (07:30)
shuffled.
because I care.
Penn (07:54)
And some of these questions are questions that have come in from listeners, but some of them have just been questions that have come up in general. So, all right, Mo's.
Moses (08:04)
Who and when was the first blind person you ever met?
I know, you just assumed.
Penn (08:17)
That's interesting. I would like to say I was the first blind person you ever met, but hopefully not.
Moses (08:24)
what was I, it was.
Penn (08:29)
I can't imagine, considering you were almost 40 when you met me. I hope you...
Moses (08:33)
No,
not very many. But I lived in Columbia, Ohio, which was just a few miles away from a town my family founded way back in the 1800s, which was Salem, Ohio. And they still celebrate my great, great,
great grandfather, Zadok Street. I know I liked it enough. And our oldest daughter, if she'd been born a boy, we were going to, we were going to name her Zadok. So she is really thrilled. She turned out a girl.
Penn (09:21)
I think Zadok is awesome. how old were you?
Moses (09:23)
It's a cool name. ⁓
⁓ That would have been seventh grade for me.
Penn (09:31)
So was it a school, like somebody in your school?
Moses (09:34)
No, it's the next door neighbor. It was a kid younger than me and he had one eye, ⁓ but he had lost the other eye. And I can't believe I remember this story. was ⁓ Harvey S. Firestone lived in Colombian and they got a big memorial and he's the guy who invented Firestone tires.
And so this kid was visiting their kind of farm kind of thing and screen doors used to have springs that went from the wall to the thing. And when he was going out one of the doors, the spring broke and hit him in the eye and took his eye out.
Penn (10:23)
⁓ my gosh. I know.
Moses (10:25)
I couldn't, yeah, and, and, and.
Penn (10:28)
So did he did he have a prosthetic eye? ⁓ really?
Moses (10:31)
No, not
at that point anyway. mean, was fairly, mean, seventh grade. So I mean, he's younger than seventh grade.
Penn (10:41)
They can put prosthetic eyes on kids. I mean, maybe not back then, but I would think so.
Moses (10:45)
Yeah, that's back before. mean, they had. ⁓
No. ⁓ Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But you got to figure that's back. They had just invented the wheel about four years. Yeah.
Penn (10:52)
Interesting.
That is true, thus firestar.
Wow, I've never heard you tell that story.
Moses (11:07)
But the first blind person that I met was, it was the cliched, ⁓ I lived in Salzburg, Pennsylvania, which was the most wonderful place for a young kid because you could do, it was like being in a Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn book. ⁓ We even lived on a river.
That was the first blind person I ever met and he at that time he had the cliche job of making brooms.
Penn (11:44)
Really? That's interesting. Cause I don't know if I knew, I don't remember the ever knowing that until this past weekend at the lions convention, somebody else was talking about, used to have these shelters or I don't know what they were called warehouses or what we're blind people would go and make brooms. And what I would love to know is
Why are blind people good at making brooms? Like what does blindness have to do with brooms?
Moses (12:17)
I know it makes no sense because it's watching. mean as kids we were just not only fascinated that he was blind but fascinated that he could because it was the old brooms not the plastic stuff like today it's hard to find an actual They're made out of straw? Yeah. And it wasn't it was the really fancy everything woven sewn.
yeah. And it was beyond even watching him do it. It was beyond me how he could do it. Not because he was blind. It was just beyond me how he could make a frigging broom. You know,
Penn (12:58)
regardless if he was blind or not. Yeah. That's interesting. I would love if anybody out there knows the story. Why? Cause I had never heard that story until this weekend. Why, why are blind people good at making brooms? Like why did that ever.
Moses (13:16)
And how many, how many blind people out there are making brooms still?
Penn (13:22)
Is that still a thing? I don't know why I've never. I heard about the piano tuning. Like I've heard that. Like a lot of blind people in the old days, they were piano tuners. And not that your hearing gets any better, but I can see the sighted world going, oh, well blind people can hear better. So let's make them piano tuners. Like I can kind of sort of see where that's going. But brooms?
Like how do brooms get associated to blind people? Okay, if you have the info, please email us, feedback at aftersight.org.
Moses (14:01)
And ⁓ because we've been hinting at the prejudice, not even hinting about the prejudice towards blind people, which is, it is a weird, well, we're going to talk about ⁓ famous people who were blind.
Penn (14:21)
But first you're going to ask me the question.
Moses (14:23)
okay, ⁓ so who and when was the first blind person you met?
Penn (14:30)
Yeah, and it's interesting because while you've, I know you're not supposed to do this, but while the other person is talking, I was trying to think of how I would answer that. ⁓ Because my mother would have been the first person, but I never really thought of her as somebody with, like I knew she couldn't see very well, but she wasn't super open about it. know, like I never, she was my mom. I didn't think of her.
with that label as being blind low vision. But the first person I legitimately remember meeting was I went to blind camp and I was probably 11, 12, maybe. Yeah, I was probably 11 or 12. And it was here in Colorado and it was the seven day Adventist. had a camp and the last week of their summer camp
they would invite up blind and Levision kids. And I remember going up there and I had definitely never been around another blind or Levision kid or even adult at that point. But to show up at a camp where there's like dozens and dozens and dozens of them ⁓ was really shocking to me. And there were these twins and I don't remember their names.
But they were in the same cabin with me. they were really... And I've been, you know, I'm the ninth of 10 kids, so I grew up babysitting and being around children my whole life. But they were so naughty, I guess, the other... Mischievous, whatever. You know, camp counselor said...
Don't go near the lake. They went near the lake. anything that like, and I think they were just, and they were so fascinating to me, not because they were blind, but because they disobeyed adults. I was, that did not happen in my world. Like if an adult told you to jump, you said, how high. And so to have these two, and they were adorable when they're not, they weren't being naughty and mischievous, but it was just,
funny to me about I remember meeting them and I knew they were blind, you know, I knew they were blind, but that did not fascinate me that they defied doing what adults said was the most obvious.
Moses (17:14)
They the ones that influenced you that wild crazy woman I met all those years ago.
Penn (17:18)
Maybe, that's another
Exactly. Yeah, we're not going to go into that. yeah. But Moses, like I think it would be fun. So if you guys have a question for us, we can add it to our deck. would be kind of fun to answer. And there are going to be a variety of things depending on what the question is each week. But feel free to send in your questions and ask us. That would be pretty cool.
Moses (17:51)
And the one I know you're all wanting to ask, so I'll just answer it. Yes, I am incredibly good looking. And Penn's even better looking.
Penn (18:07)
⁓ So, Moses and I, when COVID hit, like everybody, we're like, what are we going to do and how are we going to get through this? we had thrown around a lot of ideas about doing a podcast. ⁓ We even had it named, remember? We're not going to say the name in case we actually ever do that podcast. It was a great name. It was a killer name.
Moses (18:30)
Everybody out there will steal it.
Penn (18:32)
But one of the things we were going to do is talk about blind and low vision people and not just blind and low vision. We were going to open it up to all disabilities, but people who influence the world, really a lot, they don't get a lot of notice for it. For the things they did. And so we, course, so I told Moses like, you know what, let's,
Let's make this happen. Let's briefly talk. We're not going to do a big dive, but we would like to talk about some of our favorite ⁓ blind LaVision people in history.
Moses (19:19)
Which is history starting today backwards.
Penn (19:25)
Like yesterday is actually history.
Moses (19:27)
Because
that's one because of Mike Myers that when we were talking about blind people were only good for making brooms and running elevators and for all you
Penn (19:42)
we got to run elevators? I
Moses (19:44)
Yeah, because, yeah. ⁓ but so going all the way from the only thing a blind person can do is make a broom up to when you hear and use your talking GPS that was invented by a blind guy.
Penn (20:03)
Absolutely. because we have just spent what, six, the past six weeks going to lion's conventions, ⁓ which lions were, ⁓ they're very, very connected to ⁓ one of my absolute favorite, favorite people, Helen Keller. So we thought we would talk about her today ⁓ because not everybody out there knows
a lot about Helen Keller. Yes, she was deaf and blind and did a lot of cool things, has a lot of cool quotes, and there's some really horrific jokes about Helen Keller, which that is my line in the sand you cannot cross. But yeah, so Helen Adams Keller, she was born June 27th, back in 1880. And then she died just a couple months after I was born. She died
June 1st, 1968. She was an American author, disability rights advocate, political activist, and of course she was a lecturer. ⁓ She was born in West Tuscumbia, Alabama, which Moses and I talked about that a few months ago when we had the privilege of going back and touring her home.
she lost her sight and her hearing after a bout of illness, which they never really talk about what that illness was, but I'm guessing it was something like scarlet fever, was going on during that time when she was only 19 months old. So she was just a little, little tight. She, and at that point, they, her and her family members came up with a communication style that
They kind of sort of understood with each other, but it was very difficult. I mean, she went from this healthy, vibrant 19-month-old to being pretty much completely in the darkness and without sound. can't even imagine how terrifying that must have been. And that until she met her very first teacher, which changed not only her life, but the entire world.
in the DeafBlind community. And of course that was her, Anne Sullivan, and they became lifelong companions. And of course Anne taught Helen sign language, and she even taught her how to read, she taught her how to write, and to use, to communicate in speech, which Helen never got super great at, but,
she was at least able to verbally communicate ⁓ some. She did go on ⁓ to get her bachelor's degree at Radcliffe College, ⁓ which is part of Harvard University. And she became the very first deaf blind person in the United States to earn a bachelor of arts degree. ⁓ And so Helen really
to me changed the trajectory of people with disabilities in general. She was a prolific writer. She wrote 14 books. She has hundreds of speeches out there and essays and they were on all kinds of topics ranging from animals, flowers in her parents' gardens to ⁓ even Mahatma Gandhi. ⁓
wrote a wonderful essay about him. And one of the things that I think that a lot of people don't know about Helen is her right for ⁓ equal rights with disabilities. was part of the women's suffrage movement and labor rights and world peace movements. And in 1909, go ahead.
Moses (24:19)
She was behind starting the ACLU, which is hugely important in this day and age.
Penn (24:30)
which is the American Civil Liberties Union. And I did not actually know that until Moses and I started kind of trying to dig into some of the facts about Helen that we didn't know. And as you know, ACLU doesn't just cover people with disabilities. It covers all kinds of things, labor rights, ⁓ you know,
racism, mean, everything. LGBTQ rights, like women, like everything. it was really, really, really cool. And a lot of you probably know the movie, ⁓ Patty Duke was in.
Moses (25:04)
Women's rights.
Yeah, and Anne Bancroft.
Penn (25:19)
and Anne Bancroft was in it. There's lots of plays that have been done about Helen. People have written stories about her. ⁓ You know, of course, The Miracle Worker, that actually came out in 1959, which is crazy. ⁓ I know that the book came out in 59, but the movie came out in 1962.
Moses (25:38)
That might
was going to say, yeah, because I was almost in high school when I saw it. but another trivia thing, which just blows me out of the water, is that ⁓ Helen was very good friends with Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone. And the way that the tie in there is that ⁓ Helen's parents were looking
for somebody who would ⁓ teach ⁓ their daughter. they were not having very much luck and nobody, and you figure this is ⁓ not long after the Civil War that she's born. And their family ⁓ had a very large plantation and they literally had slaves, which they of course didn't have that in the movie. ⁓
but ⁓ they could not find a teacher willing to go to the South during reconstruction and all of that. Anne, ⁓ or I'm saying Anne Bancroft, Anne Sullivan, ⁓ she herself couldn't hear very well and she was partially blind, right, Penn? Yeah. And she had actually been put in one of the hellholes
Penn (26:59)
and so on.
Yes.
Moses (27:13)
for blind people. I forget how she got out, but.
Penn (27:20)
He got her out. He met her. Oh, and Alexander about
Moses (27:23)
I
didn't realize she was brilliant.
Penn (27:25)
Yeah, like beyond brilliant. Like her IQ was amazing. And so he knew the Keller family. And so he was like, I have a teacher for you.
Moses (27:37)
But it was kind of like ⁓ in a movie, you know, where the only guy totally incapable of doing anything gets stuck being a superhero ⁓ is that since they couldn't get anybody to go south, had, ⁓ she had nothing going for her. And so that is the only reason she went down there. ⁓
⁓ is there was just no other options because she had come out of an institution, ⁓ was partially blind, partially hard of hearing.
Penn (28:17)
her story in itself is pretty, and the Keller family was fairly wealthy, which to me plays a huge part in the story too, that they don't really talk about. Because if Helen was born in a lower class family, financially lower class family, she never would have.
been able to get a teacher. We would not know Helen Keller and we would not know Anne Sullivan. But because Helen's father was, and her mother came from a wealthy family that day. So Moses and I got to actually, which we've shared this on the podcast, we got asked to go to Tuscumbia for the 100th anniversary celebration in...
Helen's home that she was born and raised in. For the Alabama Lions clubs invited us down and, that was, it was wonderful, but it also was extremely frustrating to me because the, the home, ⁓ the property is less accessible now than probably when Helen was there.
Which blew me away. Helen Keller asked the Lions Clubs in 1925, she went to their convention, international convention, and asked them to be Knights of the Blind. And they accepted the request and they promised Helen Keller that moving forward that the Lions Club would be there to...
to help blind and low vision people. so that's what the Lions, that's what their mission is. So to go to Helen Keller's birthplace and not have it accessible, there was hardly any braille. The only braille that was there was very new and it was only on one of the exhibits. And then two, three nights a week during the summer, they put on a play.
about Helen's life on the property. So it's really, really cool because the play is going on about her life and it's there, right? It's the property.
Moses (30:46)
bit as good as the movie, if not better. was so amazing.
Penn (30:50)
But
it's not audio described. So anybody like me in the audience, and if there was somebody who was deaf, hard of hearing, they wouldn't have been able to access what they were saying. And it was just kind of crazy that Helen spent her life advocating for equal rights, accessibility, and here in her home,
town, her home, that they've turned into a museum isn't accessible. Like that is just mind boggling to me.
Moses (31:29)
And, and, ⁓ but it, it, it, what, yeah. Cause like the rooms, the rooms were almost identical to what they had been. ⁓ the whole layout was just phenomenal. And so it worked great for me because, because you couldn't go into the rooms.
Penn (31:51)
They had one of those little.
Moses (31:52)
⁓ The only way that Penn got a clue at what the inside of the house looked like is, and we've done this ever since we've been together, if I photograph it and then she can... Phone. Yeah, she can see it.
Penn (32:09)
blow it up really big on the-
Even then it's not, it's not super clear, right? Like I would see something and I'd be like, what is this? You know? ⁓ But if you were, if you had less sight than me remaining sight, you, wouldn't, I mean, to me it was neat. I, especially upstairs where her bedroom was as a child, there was a, there was a bench in the hallway at the landing and I just sat there. ⁓ I just sat there and
like kind of breathed in and imagined her being there and her growing up. And then when, you know, they have the little cabin right next to the house where Ann taught her. they have a, you know, a modern day version of the pump there that you could touch. But yeah, but, or the trees that were growing there were supposedly,
you know, were the same trees that were growing back then. And that was neat. I got to touch the trees and pretend I could, you know, hear her climbing them and things. But, but yeah, it was just crazy that they didn't have braille everywhere.
Moses (33:24)
but another bit of trivia, the famous ⁓ little tiny cottage, had two rooms in it and a front porch. ⁓ That cottage was literally right next to the, ⁓ and ⁓ maybe 20 steps from the front porch of one to the front porch of the other. And so to, ⁓
Penn (33:41)
a few yards away.
Moses (33:53)
They tricked Helen Keller by putting her saying she had to go away from the family because the family was one of the reasons she was so dysfunctional because all they wanted, and this is part of the prejudice towards blind people that just still drives me nuts, is all they wanted was for Anne to ⁓ train their daughter
so that she would be like a really well behaved dog. they.
Penn (34:26)
Because they had dogs in their family and they wanted
Moses (34:29)
Yeah,
and Ann sitting there, you know, just appalled and that's disgusting to train a human to be a well-trained dog. ⁓ But they tricked Helen ⁓ and they put her in a wagon and they rode the wagon all over town for a long time so that Helen would think that she was far, far, far away from her family and so could not run away or do anything like that.
But they came back and lived in the little cottage 20 steps from the mansion.
Penn (35:06)
I know. And because she couldn't hear, right? She was totally deaf. She couldn't hear her mother just a feet away. I just think that's cruel. Yeah. Absolutely. Like I understand why Anne wanted to remove her from the family. But I also understand why the family didn't want Anne to literally take her away because it was their daughter, you know? she, was everything. If you think about things back then, everything was brand new, right?
You know, like there wasn't anything to compare it to, yeah, Anne really had to fight the family and...
Moses (35:47)
they threatened to fire her and gave her ⁓ a time limit that if she didn't get something out of their kid, they were going to fire her. But that comes to me, since we're getting relatively close to wrap up, is the prejudice towards blind people is just mind boggling to me. ⁓
Penn (35:50)
Many times.
Moses (36:14)
incredibly irritating because of, I've learned to deal with it as to how people treat my wife. And like if, if Penn and I are talking to somebody, not people she knows really well, but if we're talking to somebody new, it is not unusual for the person to talk to me in
expecting me to translate for her since she's incapable of thought and speech because she can't see. And that's irritating. Well, a lot of it's just funny to me at this point. ⁓ But my first major shock was I was working this job and ⁓ a guy, a friend,
And he comes up to me and very sincerely and heartfelt, goes, goes, Moses, he says, I am just amazed, proud, ⁓ and think it is just the most wonderful thing that you're sacrificing so much to take care of a blind woman.
And I'm sitting there going, I didn't know I was taking care of her for, ⁓ so that was the big shock. And, so this woman that I am taking care of, ⁓ it was like our third date before I even realized she couldn't see. And then she ran my portrait studio. I mean, she ran it. She did the books. She did the taxes. She did the talking to people. She did.
everything except shoot and she was often at shoots ⁓ to help the clients do little things. And ⁓ so it was like one of the funny ones is that ⁓ Penn would help them with makeup and hair and the people would go, how do I look? How do I look? And Penn of course can't see them and she'd go, ⁓ you look really good. No, it's perfect. It's perfect. ⁓ But it was,
and then I knew, like I did not know that people saw me as an eccentric person. And it took years and years and years, but I had figured it out by the time ⁓ Penn and I got together. And ⁓ one of the telltales for an eccentric person is that people either really like you or they do not like you at all. They don't want to be around you.
okay, because you're an obnoxious eccentric. And so I was well aware that everybody who met Penn loved Penn. so Penn was the front man for the portrait studio for 20 years, because I would get so wrapped up in the creative part and we're going to do this, we're going to do that and bore people to tears and scare them.
Penn (39:22)
I'd be like, where's your credit card? Yeah. I made sure you got paid.
Moses (39:25)
Yeah,
so Penn was the whole reason that the port because at that point I was doing a pretty regular everyday portrait studio and Penn was the whole reason that it was such a success because everybody like when somebody's looking for a wedding photographer or a portrait photographer they go with the photographer doesn't really matter how good they are
⁓ They'll go for who they like. And so Penn got shoot after shoot after shoot that I never would have gotten. So she was taking care of me and now she has her own career and is still taking care of me.
So, I guess thank you dear for, ⁓ I cannot believe that you've spent so much of your life taking care of a centric old fart.
Penn (40:29)
It guarantees me to get into heaven.
Moses (40:32)
Oh,
that would get into another story. But yeah, when, but the prejudice towards blind people, and you can jump in at any time, Penn, but the prejudice towards blind people as I see it is that it's a sympathy prejudice and that people, you know that
a person who can't see is absolutely useless. They can't do anything because they can't see. because of that, ⁓ you, when you're talking on a telephone, you're blind, you can't see that person, you can't see where they are, and you're still functioning. Close your eyes.
Okay, while you're listening to this, did you instantly get stupid? I don't think you get stupid when you close your eyes. I don't. I close my eyes to come up with new photo ideas. But if people just think that blind people are hopeless and because of that, they are
the most educated group in America, far above the average American in education, but nobody will hire them. And so we're experiencing a renaissance because nobody will hire these highly educated, brilliant people because they were brilliant before they lost their sight and huge personalities before they lost their sight. They are becoming entrepreneurs.
and are making way more money than I ever made. yeah, so when you're beating...
Penn (42:26)
And that's why I think it's really awesome. mean, it's one of the reasons we started The Blind Chick is we wanted to give people who are blind and low vision the platform to tell their stories. And so that's why, but there are all those people that came before us. So that's why I love reading history about blind and low vision people who
without them, we would not be where we are today. And they're gone, right? Like we can't have them on the blind chick. So Moses and I are gonna try to bring them back to life a little bit on the blind chick. really, without, like to me, Helen Keller, it was when I was still in the hospital. And I had known about, I was nine, we must've learned about Helen.
when I was in school, ⁓ know, elementary school, but there was a nurse in the hospital that, you know, got me the audio version of her book. And I listened to it on the recorder when I was still in the hospital. And of course she instantly became my hero and I wanted to learn everything about her and...
You know, I got all of the books that I could possibly find on her and stuff and learn because Helen Keller really is a symbol for me that I look up to and.
Moses (44:03)
Right.
Penn (44:04)
So yeah, so we, that's one of the reasons we want to kind of talk about those that went before us. Cause we get to talk to, you know, the Sean Cashmere is on the Eric Wymer's and you know, Steven Vines and I'm, I'm, I'm going to miss a bunch of people, of course, but, um, you know,
Moses (44:24)
Yeah. And to me,
to me, what Penn's saying is that that spread the word about the blind chick because one of our primary goals is all these interviews, we are talking to superior human beings. We're talking to brilliant people. We're talking to highly skilled individuals who just can't see. And, and it's
the more people, sighted people, more blind people that we can get listening to break this prejudice that people have towards the blind.
Penn (45:06)
Yeah, because right now, mean, my, Moses is correct, you know, every single guest we've had on, and this is just the, not even the tip of the iceberg. This is, this is an icicle on the iceberg that we've covered over the last three years. There's so many, so many more stories out there. So many more of you that I would love to talk to you. But we don't know you exist, right? Like we, we can't find the connection to you.
⁓ But you can find the connection to me a lot easier. All you have to do is email me feedback at aftersite.org. But it's important because I know when I was young, if I knew, I knew about Helen Keller, but she was already gone, right? I knew I was going to better because of the work she did.
But then of course, you learn about like Stevie Wonder and especially Ray Charles, right? But they're not your neighbor. They're not your friends in school, right? They're not sitting in the pew across from you at church. It's really important that we have everyday heroes that are still here, but also that we celebrate and bring
spread that light on the ones that have gone before us.
Moses (46:36)
Right. ⁓ yeah, especially that's heartfelt for me because I'm so friggin old that I have outlived all my living heroes. That's right. You are my number one hero.
Penn (46:49)
I'm still here,
wah, wah, wah. No, true. On that note, ⁓ thank you all so much for dropping in week after week. Thank you for your emails and your kindness. ⁓ Jim, you're still our number one fan. But yeah, reach out to us. If you have a question you'd like Moses and I to ask, if you have somebody that's in history that we may not know about that we could do a little bit of research and...
shine the light on them, that would be wonderful. Or if you would like to be on the blind chick, ⁓ it's really easy. Just email, you know, feedback at aftersite.org and we'll do our very, very best to make it come to life.
Moses (47:41)
Yeah. So. And that's, that's one, ⁓ you can ask about the things like what it's like to live with a blind person or a blind person living with a sighted person. But one of the funny things is when we meet couples where one of the people is blind, it always ends up separating where the two blind people are talking. And, ⁓ so far it's usually husbands. And so the guys get together and we start talking.
And it gets really, really funny because all the hardships after you've been together for a long time, they're funny. They're not hardships anymore, but it's fun to talk about them. And it gets really funny. The guy's talking about what it's like to be married to a blind person. Yeah.
Penn (48:29)
Yeah,
absolutely. ⁓ I do want to give a little shout out. ⁓ Last week's episode was with Jean Parker. If you have not listened to it, you got to go back and listen to it. It was a great interview. It's one I'm extremely proud of doing. We love Jean. She'll be on again and again and again.
Moses (48:49)
She is.
She's
about a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, she's always been a reporter and she has done adventures blind that I can't imagine any sighted person having the nerve to
Penn (49:09)
She's definitely one of those modern day heroes that's still with us. go back and go back and check that out. All right, we're gonna jump off because we are rambling now.
Moses (49:16)
She's incredible.
I know, but I gotta go back.
Penn (49:22)
But thank you all. I hope you're having a good week so far. And remember to find a way to be kind to yourselves this week and find a way to be kind to somebody else. It's good for your soul.