This week’s post covers a topic I touched on in the last post. I already discussed how that gentleman on the porch picked the most awkward phrase possible—“that problem”—to refer to my blindness. But worse than that was how he asked my teacher about my blindness instead of asking me. He referred to me in the third person as if I were not there at all. I’ve had so many of these types of interactions with strangers that by now most of them have just faded into one frustrating blur. But one of these incidents was so egregious that I’m pretty sure it will live on forever in my memory. I’m going to retell it here and then deconstruct it. Then by analyzing that incident, I will be able to explain what not to do when interacting with a blind person, why not to do it, and what to do instead. I was walking around the mall with a friend. It was just a chill hangout sesh. We were chatting as we meandered through, not really looking for any stores in particular,, though we did stop ...