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Humans can be a mixed bag
By Brian D. Rossman
Humans are a strange breed. Sometimes they can be maddening. Other times uplifting.
My friend Greg is a licensed trainer of a guide dog for the blind. He attended months of training classes before adopting Mozelle, his golden Labrador retriever. Greg becomes the puppy's sole caregiver for one year. His obligation is to train and provide for Mozelle with no expectation of financial compensation.
The goal is to train the puppy to become an official guide dog for the vision-impaired. Part of the "guide dog for the blind" credo and training process is that the puppy should be exposed to as many different environments as possible to prepare it to go wherever its blind master may go. As a result, Mozelle has been more places than most of us have been this year. Aside from shopping at Home Depot, eating at Chevy's, and taking coffee breaks at Starbucks, Mozelle has gone camping in Yosemite, water-skiing in Idaho and to an Oakland A's playoff game--all as part of her training. No establishment or manager has batted an eye. In fact, most have been extremely gracious and welcoming, except for one thoughtless individual.
The incident occurred at the annual San Francisco Blues Festival when a security guard refused Greg and Mozelle entrance.
"You can't bring a dog inside," grumbled the unkempt forty-something-year-old man, wearing a security shirt and holding a walkie-talkie.
"This is a guide dog in training," Greg explained, pointing to Mozelle's official green jacket. "I don't care what the dog is, unless you are blind, you can't bring the dog inside."
Greg pulled out his official license as a trainer and informed him that the American with Disabilities Act requires that the disabled be allowed to enter into any venue where someone without an impairment can enter. A guide dog in training is allowed the same access for the same purpose. The explanation was lost on the security guard.
"I don't care. If you bring the dog inside, what am I going to tell everyone else who has a dog?"
"That this is a guide dog in training as stated on her official jacket."
"I don't care. The answer is still no."
Greg requested to speak with his supervisor. He refused, and ordered the ticket takers not to accept Greg's ticket and to block the entrance. "At this point," Greg says, "I found an officer who had jurisdiction over the park. She was quite familiar with the 'guide dog for the blind' program as she had trained a puppy herself previously. Accordingly, she allowed us access and explained the rationale to the security guard. As we walked into the park, we could still hear him saying, 'I don't care.'"
Fortunately, that same evening was the opening ceremony of the Olympics. The true spirit of humanity was now on display. Well, actually there were a number of incidents that undermined this claim, such as the repeated drug violations by the athletes and the irreverence by the Russian women's gymnastics team in only winning the silver medal. However, for the most part, the Olympics were quite uplifting.
During the first week, we witnessed the efforts of Terence Parkin, the 20-year-old South African swimmer, who was born with a severe hearing disability. Parkin explained his motivation, "I am going to the Olympics to represent South Africa, but it's so vitally important for me to go, to show that the deaf can do anything." He did. He won a silver medal in the men's 200-meter breast stroke. You can bet he appreciated the silver medal more than the Russian gymnasts.
During the second week, there were two lasting images that come to mind. The first was Alozie Glory, the 100-meter-hurdle silver medalist, who somehow managed to race and win a silver medal, after losing her fiancé, a fellow Nigerian, weeks earlier in Sydney. To witness her courageous effort and her tribute to her lost partner was triumphant.
Similarly, there was Marla Runyan's performance. Runyan, a top-ranked middle-distance runner who has been legally blind since age 9, qualified for the finals of the 1500-meter race. Think this is difficult? Try sprinting with your eyes closed for 100 feet. Would you be standing at the end? Now try sprinting four times around the track at world-class speed with 10 other runners jockeying for position. Runyan finished in eighth place only three seconds behind the gold medalist. That is the definition of human spirit.
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Campbell, California
