Child Philosipher

         Even though he was born blind, he often spoke of how he saw things. Of how the seasons feel and smell. The softness of the coming spring, he said, is like a flower unfolding itself, and pointing towards the sky to absorb sunlight and love. Can you smell the working bees? He asked me that, my answer, of course, was no.
         Summer is like the sun, it’s bright and round, and full of surprises. It feels like leather. The air, he says, is thick, like a hide, from all the tension of summer drama. He was right of course, but I wouldn't describe it that way.
         Fall was swift and easy. "It's like a wolf. It can run through trees like no other." He also said it was like death, but also like new life. The pungent odor filled his nostrils as he asked me if I could smell the question lingering in the air. He said fall was like a question that winter would answer when the time was right. "Winter will come," he said, "with all its power and frustration, it will dash through destroying countless homes and lives." Whose homes? Whose lives? Winter was winter. Plain and boring as can be.
         I was one of the many who thought Carter Woods was just a blind spot of nothingness on the middle school food chain. I would say," He can't see, he doesn't know anything." But he does know something. Actually, he knows a lot of something. A lot more something than I, Miley Gray would ever know. Or even come close to understanding.
         Until the eighth grade, the grade I offer Carter a seat in lunch. That day I stop being mean and realize how far a little kindness can go, and how that kindness affects me.
         I also learn how much a blind eighth grader can want to learn how to ride a bike. And how many times people can tell him it won't work before my heart breaks from the knowledge that I can help but choose not to because he is different.