"I came in dead last. That's OK."
Those were my brother's words after the adventure he had this past Saturday night. They were more than the words of a gracious loser.
My brother is legally blind. He has retinitis pigmentosa, a congenital condition that is robbing him of his sight. It's incurable. His vision is 20/400 or worse.
And yet on Saturday, he donned a fire suit and helmet and climbed behind the wheel of a race car to compete with other blind drivers.
Yes, you heard me right. My brother drove in a race of blind drivers. Madnesss? No. The thrill of a lifetime and for a good cause? That's more like it.
He took part in the Eye Rock race at Lebanon Valley Speedway, a fundraiser for Camp Abilities, a summer camp for blind and deaf-blind children in New York State. The race pairs blind drivers with professional race car drivers for a few laps around the track. The blind drivers are behind the wheel; the pros ride shotgun and tell the drivers what to do — turn left, turn right, hit the gas, hit the brake, etc.
It seems unfathomable to me, but it's a great program, and it really works. It means so much to the drivers. My brother's eyesight began to fail him in his late-20s. He stopped driving around 1998. For a few minutes on Saturday, he was behind the wheel again. "Here's something I was told I could probably never do again, and I did it," my brother said. Some of the drivers have been blind since birth and have never driven. Imagine the feeling of moving through space at 40 or 50 miles per hour after a whole lifetime of measured, careful steps.
I have to give a lot of credit to the pro drivers who volunteer to help these blind drivers. Race car drivers are never short on courage, but it must take a certain amount of courage and a high degree of generosity of spirit to do this.
After a few laps in which my brother got clipped by another car once and almost veered into the wall once, the race ended. My brother was dead last, but he didn't care. He said for most of his turn behind the wheel, he was too focused on what he was doing to be scared. Lost in a moment he thought he would never experience again. That's why last place was good enough.