The Thoughts of a Blind Man

[Suno_Regin]

Aral walked down one of the streets in Hydlaa, touching around with his cane, trying to find a good place where he can get a night\'s rest. As he was doing so, he began thinking about the kindness he has recieved in Hydlaa those last few days.

\"It has been a long time since I\'ve talked to people. Back home, I merely said \"hello,\" or \"thank you,\" but nothing like this. People actually listen to me, and have decent conversations about things other than weapons.\" Aral laughed a bit to himself, then continued his thoughts, not realizing that he has been saying everything out loud. \"Yes, the old and new generations listen. It seems as though they have lived a very peaceful life, each and every one of them. They have even found the time to help me around, without me asking.\"

Aral stopped walking, and sat against a wall to get some sleep, placing his cane on the ground. He had a very happy look on his face, as people were walking by, looking at him sitting there, before he finally fell asleep for the night.

When he awoke, he felt something laying on top of a piece of cloth next to him, most likely placed there by a helpful traveller. He took a bite of it, realizing then that it was bread.

\"This life is nice...I do not want to ever return home. These people are like a family to me...\" He said, relaxing in the spot where he was sitting.

[Stephen McNaire]

Interesting little skecthcy...but I\'m curious about this line:

\"He had a very happy look on his face, and watched people walking by, looking at him, smiling back at him, before he finally fell asleep for the night.\"

*Is confused* Is he blind or not?

[Suno_Regin]

Oops, didn\'t catch that. (You have no idea how hard it is to do this. Blind people aren\'t easy, you want to say the word looked so badly. =P)

[Stephen McNaire]

Aha, I see:P. Well, trying to write like a blind person is the only way to get it :D. I was going to give advice on how to change the sentance, but when I looked to re-read the sentance, I saw you had already fixed it :D.

But it still needs a little fix. You have the story from his point of view, but the line pulls out of that when it says:
\"[A]s people were walking by, looking at him sitting there\"

Now we\'ve left his world to come to ours with sight to tell that people are looking at him. It should still be with his senses, something like this:
\"He had a very happy look on his face as he listened to people walking by, sensing their gazes brush over him sitting there, before he finally drifted off to sleep for the night.\"

Something like that. Anyhow, I would like to read more about this interesting person. You should write more about his daily life. If would be fun to see how he handles things that we would breeze right through being able to see.

[Father Sengus]

\"He had a very happy look on his face as he listened to people walking by, sensing their gazes brush over him sitting there, before he finally drifted off to sleep for the night.\"

Nice very short story Like McNaire said, you should try writing more.
If you can\'t use the word \"see\" there are lots of other words that can be used instead, but what is always important to keep in mind is how well developed the character\'s other senses are.
If he for example is a blind man who hasn\'t learned to compensate for his blindness with better hearing or smelling he probably won\'t be able to know what other people are doing. That\'s when he uses his instinct, just like McNaire did in his example: \"sensing their gazes brush over him sitting there\".  None of his senses could have given him that information.
You also have different words you can use depending on what senses the blind person uses the most (though I doubt anybody will compensate blindness through good tasting ability ). So you can use basic words like hear, touch (feel), smell and notice, but also words that can be related to some kind of instinct, like sense and feel.
Hope to read more soon

[Suno_Regin]

I\'m surprised this got as much comments as it did. Aral was just a character I made for pure RP. As I navigated (bumping into walls and other things, before finally deciding to look at my screen and reduce my chat window to normal size) people gave Aral plenty of money for food, and also helped him get around. Since there are demands for me to expand the story a little, I guess I\'ll make it into a series like all the others.

But it still needs a little fix. You have the story from his point of view, but the line pulls out of that when it says: \"[A]s people were walking by, looking at him sitting there\"

Thanks for pointing this out. I didn\'t intend to put it in both views, narrator and first person, but once I can come up with a substitute sentence, this will suffice. Aral can\'t really sense anything, he\'s around his 60\'s in age, so hearing and other senses are weak. For him, he can only rely on feel, unlike younger blind people who rely on sound, so he tries to sharpen his hearing, or just use his cane to navigate (which by the way is very hard to do with the chat window filling up the entire screen, bump-navigation is unrealistic, so I just act it out, instead of blinding myself as well.)