Charles

          There I was holding his arm around the grocery store trying to guide him in the right direction to find eggs.  It was I a 23 year old white male guiding the arm of an 83 year old African American male through Wal-Mart helping him shop.  A few months before we did not know each other, but now we were great friends.  I met Charles Sorrell from a job that I took trying to make some extra money for Grad School.  The job involved managing a storage facility and Charles happened to have a storage unit in the building.  In the beginning he used to walk into the office, sit in one of the chairs and just be there.  It was not until a few weeks in that I noticed he did this every day.  Charles was without a family so he became my family.  He had lost his sight from diabetes and needed help to do a lot of things, but his routine was so consistent that he knew when to get on the bus to be at the facility just when it opened.

            As the weeks went by we began to find out a lot about each other.  He had served in the Military for 8 years and lived in almost every state in the US.  I was just out of school and trying to get a job to further advance my career.  Two opposite sides of the spectrum that somehow met in the middle.  He was always full of advice about growing up and making mistakes and I was trying to tell him how the world was different now.  A lot was learned from our conversations and he always brought a smile to my face. 

            How could he remain so happy?  Walking around this world in darkness all the time, only hearing what was happening around him.  Somehow he was doing it.  The man was never sad and although I had seen him in the hospital and a little bit down, he always kept a positive outlook.  The last day he was in the hospital was the day that really changed the way I think.  He was lying in his bed drained of energy and very run down.  As I walked into the room the nurse said, “Sorry sir this is for family only”.  Charles looked at her and responded, “Sarah, can’t you see this is my brother.”  I went to his bed and hugged him. Wouldn’t it be nice if we all thought like Charles?  The fact that his sight was gone was not a disability, but instead gave him the ability to see inside a person.  I truly believe the loss of sight, in the end, improved his real vision.