humanity

I found Kat Brady, our guest speaker in class this past tuesday, very true to her ideals and desire to be a real community and a friendly family based society where family is more than your blood relatives. That is one thing i love about hawaiian culture is the attitude; that your friends and neighbors are your family and are titled as aunties and uncles. What grabbed the focus of the talk and attention of the students was the memorable experiences with inmates of prisons. At first I would have never associated myself with anyone behind bars let alone think that we have anything in common whether it be hobbies or hopes and dreams. However I did have an experience that made me a little less naive. I work at an eye clinic and we had an emergency call from Queens ER that asked if we could follow up on a patient they had there. The person was from the federal prison and had been hit multiple times in the face and jabbed in both eyes with an object. I had the opportunity to do the initial work up before the doctor sees him. He had completely lost sight in his right eye and could barely make out any images with his left eye, labeling him legally blind. He would never regain sight in his right eye again. While I was testing his vision in the exam room, he began to cry. It was not simply tearing and sniffling, it was a full out sobbing, that made my heart go out for this man who had lost something that's so important to all of us, our sight. This experience just made me think that this man, who I had first just labeled as a criminal, whom I'd have no common ground with, is actually just like everyone else and just like me. We are all people and all make mistakes and we just have to know to forgive one another, move one and live happily in peace together.