Take Me Onto the Ball Field

By Neven Humphreys

Being born with just one good eye, you can imagine how tough it was for me to take part in certain sports when I was young. And the worst had to be baseball. Hey, even if the pitcher just tossed the ball at me, I couldn’t hit it because I’d lose sight of it, thus striking out, and making all my teammates angry at me. So I then tried not to swing the bat at all, and thus get to first base on balls. It worked at first; but then, teachers and camp monitors started tiring of me doing that. And so, they started standing behind me and screaming at me to hit the ball; some even grabbed the bat, and tried to help me swing it! FINALLY, in Grade 10, a gym teacher realized that I couldn’t see the ball and got me a ball tee. After that, I loved baseball a bit more.

I also had trouble in other sports, notably those where I had to kick a ball, such as soccer or American football. Let’s just say that my kicks were weak and not on target. And don’t even mention hockey; I never played. (Thank goodness.) As for volleyball, and racket sports, I often had synchronicity issues, thus trouble serving. The rest of the sports we held at school, I was able to hold my own.

Soon after graduating from high school, I went to SCORE Camp, at the time in Brantford, Ontario. And it was there that I learned about a sport unique to blind or visually-impaired athletes: goalball. I even got to play with national goalball champion, (future Paralympic relay swimming medallist, and Member of Parliament for Delta, BC)--Carla Qualtrough. I don’t remember if we won, but I do remember that it was tougher than I thought. Yet fun.

I didn’t do a lot of sports while I was studying in CEGEP and university; and after I graduated from university, and then struggled to find employment in the rural setting where I was living, I spent most of my time working on the family farm. It was only when I moved to Ottawa that I started doing sports again.

A little anecdote when I was studying in CEGEP: I was prevented from taking a swimming course, because the teacher “didn’t want to have to watch over me all of the time”. Needing to take one Phys. Ed. course every semester, and with even less palatable options, I complained to the administration, and was allowed to take a theoretical course on sports, followed by a soccer course.

I moved to the Ottawa region in 2001. In 2005. I discovered blind curling through the first-ever National Blind Curling Championships in Ottawa during White Cane Week. It fascinated me how a sport that required exact precision could be practised by people with little or no vision. But I quickly found out that they were helped by sighted assistants who told them how to shoot the stones. Inspired, I decided to join the local blind curling team. Now, I wasn’t very good, except for throwing kill shots. I stayed on the team for about six months, even going to a tournament in Kitchener, (but didn’t play), and then I moved on to another sport--rowing.

In 2006, a local competitive rower decided to start a project to teach rowing to blind and visually-impaired people. Enjoying a challenge, I decided to join.

The original idea was for teams of eight visually-impaired rowers and a sighted coxswain to operate Eights rowing shells. Each rower had a long two-handed oar called a sweeper, and you had to learn how to row in unison. Theoretically, rowing looks quite easy--just put the oar in the water and pull. However, if the oar is not dipped in the water correctly, it could get stuck, (something called a crab); and getting it unstuck took so much force it could knock you backwards pretty hard. Also, if you weren’t quite synchronized, you would hit the oar of the person in front or behind you. After a while, I started hating it and would only go because some of the other rowers were friends of mine. Luckily, the instructor then found an alternative for me--sculling.

Sculling is a different kind of rowing, since it’s done with two short oars. You still needed to dip the oars in the water correctly; but if you hit a crab, it was easier to get out of it. Thus, I preferred that type of rowing. And except for the time that I got caught in the middle of the Ottawa River when the water was choppy, my rowing sessions were quite enjoyable.

In 2007, me and three other blind rowers took part in the National Rowing Regatta, in St. Catharines, Ontario, to race against two other teams of handicapped rowers. We finished dead last, but we did have fun. Later that year, I also took part in a 10-kilometre rowing marathon, which I completed in just under an hour.

Unfortunately, in 2008, the instructor moved to China, and the program was cancelled.

Two years later, I was invited to another activity: 5-pin bowling. Now, I hadn’t bowled since high school, and it had been 10-pin bowling, (strangely with 5-pin balls). And again, I was surprised that visually-impaired people could play something that required so much precision as bowling. But, as I found out, they have guides or ramps to help them.

So how did I do? At first, not very good; due to me having only one eye, I couldn’t aim right, and the bowling ball would nearly always roll into the gutter. Someone suggested I throw the ball with both hands; and using the arrows just after the foul line, I was able to aim better. And how much better did I get? I once threw five strikes in a row. But I also discovered that the more tense I was, the worse I bowled. So whenever I got two bad frames, I would sit down and try to relax before I had to bowl again.

During my subsequent 10 years of bowling, I took part in many provincial blind bowling tournaments. Team Ottawa won a good share of those tournaments, and I was also named Best Visually-Impaired Male Bowler twice. Overall, I really enjoyed my time bowling.

But unfortunately, 2020 came, and the COVID pandemic. Added to the fact that 5-pin bowling alleys were closing all over Ottawa, that was the end of blind bowling in the city.

Since then, I haven’t taken part in any other sports activities, so I take walks to stay in shape. Would I join another blind sport or activity? I’m getting on in years; but if it’s an activity that I can still do, I’d probably do it.