Driving While Blind: Rubbermaid Cars In Your Dream

By: CaspHer

November 23, 2017

For starters, I probably shouldn’t be using my technology on feast day but I will anyway.

For many people who dream about driving it is not a big deal but for someone who was born with blindness it is a different experience. To dream about driving while blind, it is a dream that lingers. It’s almost like the lingering feeling after a nightmare or a very lucid dream. This disconnected feeling hangs around all day, it remains through all of your daily activity especially when you take a break. It is only a “disconnected” feeling because you’ve never truly experienced driving.

I grew up in a household of seven other siblings who were all sighted and hearing. I was the only person born with blindness and deafness, therefore never being exposed to other blind people lead me to believe I was “sighted” too. Never in my younger years did I ever think driving would be out of the question for me. I was under the impression that I would get to drive a lipstick red Pontiac G6 by the age of eighteen. I soon found out that driving was indeed out of the question. I was far too blind to ever drive. I was temporarily sad but instantly got over it. I can’t miss something I’ve never gotten the luxury of using which was sight.

I often went around talking to my peers about getting my favorite car. The only reason why I knew I liked the Pontiac G6 was because I loved speed. I realized the car was able to make sharp turns, take off quickly and that was because of a friend who rented the car for me. This photographer friend grew insane from hearing me gush over the darn car. One day, he surprised me with the car and took me for a drive around Boston in my favorite car. I told him, “Let’s drive down Soldiersfeild Rd in Brighton, MA, lets go at full speed,” I wanted to drive as fast as the car could go. I wanted to sink into the seat while we hit the gas. Unfortunately, he saw a trooper hiding in the cut. The dream of driving fast was instantly smashed and powdered. So, we took it to the parking lot of a church near my house.

Let’s just say sneaking to drive fast in the parking lot also failed. I kept hearing sirens zipping by and we both agreed not to drive at all.

A year or two ago, I randomly had a very vivid and lucid dream about driving at night and it was awesome and mysterious at the same time. The mysterious part was that there was another person in the car with me. I could not figure out who it was but there was another person there. However, I got to drive as fast as I wanted to drive. I was driving at night! I crashed into another car and our cars bounced away like rubbermaid cars! No one got injured thankfully. Our cars kept clashing and bouncing apart from one another which was partly amusing.

I still wonder what it is like to actually drive on the road but someone said, “you aren’t missing anything at all” and I’d like to believe that. Being me, i still want to drive an actual gas guzzling car on the road. Another person told me,”all you are doing is moving a hunk of metal that weighs thousands of pounds around, there’s nothing fun” but I still want to drive.

Around five years ago, I discovered this pretty song by Everything But The Girl called, “Driving” and that song was my anthem for years. I kept that song a secret from friends because it sounded better that way. That song carries a load of connected thoughts and feels for me. Especially the urge to drive even when it would be a disaster nationwide.

So, while I was walking around the streets of Minneapolis and Boston, I would be singing the song, “Driving” while swiping with my cane. I am pretty sure this looked odd to those who could see and drive; a blind woman singing about driving as fast as wheels can turn. In addition to that, I would be singing that song like I wrote the damn thing! EBTG may as well have given me the rights to that song at the time. During training, transcribed the song “Driving” to braille for my classmates to read. Everyone agreed that the song was indeed a pretty song. Sooner or later, people recognized my cane tap and began singing the song. My cane tap sounds like a drag and tap sensation that happens consistently and in a quick pace while others tap or drag constantly. Eventually, I acquired an elevator full of people singing the song with me, that was humorous. All of the cane users came out of the elevator leaving the onlookers in shock.

I had a discussion about what i would have been doing if I were sighted and driving was one of the first things I blurted out. If I were sighted like many other people I have been around, I would instantly get a drivers license and join the military. I wanted to be a Marine had blindness never followed me since birth. People ask about the blindness and I would also remember, “Oh yeah…I’m not like my peers” but the conversation continues. I answer their questions as my opportunity to educate the public about blindness. I also think I would have gotten so many speeding tickets because I dislike slow drivers, I get road rage for the driver as a passenger especially since living in Boston.

Until then, I will continue to dream about driving with my Rubbermaid cars.