My three day experiment in New York proved some things beyond joy. I was a “newbie” to guide dog land. I didn’t know one could go from exultation to misery in seconds. After walking in Central Park, Corky and I tried entering a mega-computer store on Sixth Avenue. I’d decided to buy a laptop pc. As we came through the door a security guard put his hand on my chest. “You no come in, no dog,” he said. I didn’t know it, but this moment would become a regular part of my life—routine as a six month checkup at the dentist’s office.
I pushed forward and the guard let go. We were in a dance of folly. He shouted in broken English, “no no no!” Customers stared. There was a fractional instant of silence. These instances happen ten thousand times a day in New York. Then the rush of ordinary noise returns. The nominal buzz. Ambient and reassuring. “No no no no!” He really was shouting.
Over time I’d learn to call these moments “culture shadows”—as strange and frequent as street shadows. I’d learn from social obstacles what I felt about life—a confirmatory, forgiving toughness. My civil rights and the security guard’s lack of education were equally delicate, equally products of culture. I didn’t know where the guard hailed from, but his accent sounded east African. How could he possibly know about guide dogs? He couldn’t. And the mega-store’s managers hadn’t given him information. All he knew was “no dogs allowed” and there I was, with a big assed dog. And so there we were: the unforeseeable amid the spontaneous and I saw it would be my job to foster dignity for both of us. They hadn’t taught me about this at Guiding Eyes; they’d given me a booklet with the access laws—a useful thing. I had the right to go anywhere the public went—but no one had mentioned emotional intelligence or how to engage in mediation.
I made Corky sit. Guide dogs sit at attention with poise. “Listen,” I said, softly, “get the manager. This will be okay.” “This is a special dog for the blind.” As the poet William Carlos Williams said, “no defeat is entirely made up of defeat”. I wanted to turn our misunderstanding into a teachable moment. “Let’s have a productive defeat,” I thought.
The manager was one of those men you see all the time in New York stores: sadder than his customers, red faced and put upon. He had a scoured toughness about him. He approached and began shouting at the guard. “Its a seeing-eye dog for god’s sake!” “Let him in!” “Sorry, sorry!”
My fight or flee rush was subsiding—I wanted all three of us to experience kindness.
I saw that transforming defeat meant having a vision of human dignity for everyone around me. I was in the proscenium arch of a dingy computer store and dignity was in peril. It would have been easy to say “fuck it” and look out for myself alone. I got into the store. But I didn’t feel that way. The guard’s name was Ekwueme. My name was Kuusisto. The manager’s name was Phil. “Listen,” I said, “dogs for the blind are not common, you don’t see them every day. This is Corky. She’s very smart.” I decided Corky could be the ambassador. I let my voice be kind. Ekwueme and Phil both pet Corky. A customer approached, said: “I’ve raised puppies for the guide dog school! Best dogs in the world!” Phil seemed suddenly pleased, as if he too was philanthropic, or could be. Ekwueme admitted he loved dogs. I’d been slow to feel good about my disability but I was going to make up for lost time. I was going to try to love myself and try like hell to love others. Maybe I could be an incidental educator along the way.
Planet of the Blind 