Without realizing, I mistakenly pressed a wrong button on my smartphone.
Before I realized what was happening, my phone was inaccessible, plus the screen was constantly speaking aloud, instructing me how to perform basic activities.
Anytime I tapped the phone, it kept repeating the time. Even when I turned the phone off in hopes of restarting it and returning it to its normal function, the screen spoke “Screen off” and “Ringer silent.”
I kept tapping around, only to hear “Dismiss double tap to reactivate double tap to perform the action” or “Actions available.”
I was stuck in a loop with no way out.
It seemed I had inadvertently pressed a feature that transforms the phone to its disability mode or visually impaired mode.
Being the technological luddite that I am, the phone wasn’t fixed until it was at the phone shop.
And for a few hours there, I held a phone that was functioning in a way that assumed my blindness.
My world had temporarily shifted to an auditory one. Every micro action was instructed to me with a voiceover.
My world suddenly felt robbed of a certain stillness I am able to thankfully rely on.
In a visual world, we are not constantly confronted with a stream of auditory information. We often passively process a critical mass of the information we absorb in a more quiet manner.
The overstimulation of the constant voice of instruction so as to communicate the state of the phone to its owner, was astounding.
We often hear about the brain re-wiring itself in order to process information differently, of a sharpened other sense, specifically an auditory compensation, for a person who is born with the absence of visual ability. Or, for that matter, other forms of compensation when dealing with a loss of any other primary sense.
This deeper sense had always been communicated as a positive, adaptive kind of development, an effective coping mechanism in dealing with disability.
What the benefit of a more sharpened and heightened sense looks like wasn’t something I had ever considered.
For the brief time my phone was turned to this disability feature, my world was flooded with what felt like overstimulation.
To hear someone, blow by blow, describe every micro action, including dormant ones, was a new experience.
Of course, the fact that our society has created technology that aids a blind person to communicate on their own hand-held phone, is nothing short of remarkable.
Getting a taste of what that actually means and entails was a real learning moment for me though.
Shifting from a visual world to an auditory world was jolting.
When I was in elementary school, daily, I passed Beit Chinuch Ivrim, the Jewish Institute for the Blind. It was around the corner from my school.
Often, if not also almost daily, I passed people negotiating their surroundings with a white cane, scanning for obstacles or alternative direction marks, so as to be on their way. It ingrained in me how, despite the Herculean challenge, there are amazing people out there, and how independent a visual impaired person can be.
Years later, when I moved to Israel, I noticed that when crossing the street, the green traffic light ticks away as a way of signaling to someone who might be visually impaired that the light is green and it is safe to cross.
Also in Israel, often times at traffic circles or other dedicated crossing points, there are sidewalk bumps.
This is not just a random quirky rise in the asphalt. This too, is by design. These bumps, or “tactile paving,” assist visually impaired people in detecting when they are about to leave the sidewalk and enter the street.
I think integrating people with disabilities into society is of utmost meaning, and a responsibility every healthy and inclusive society ought to carry and implement.
It is a value I personally imbibed in Israel, and thankfully we do live in a more inclusive world. For it is a mission that truly does go beyond any difference of race, religion, border or nationality.
Yesterday, my smartphone decided to provide me with the experience of what living in an exclusively auditory world feels like.
I hope I heard its message and will redouble my efforts in bringing more light, more voice and more resonance to this important societal feature in our lives.
We never know from one day to the next who the haves or the have-nots amongst us are, or might be. Inviting the conversation and integration of disability into society and our lives might just be the first step.
Jewish Disabilities Awareness and Inclusion Month kicks off Feb. 1.
