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www.nfbofmississippi.org |  |
Jim SkeltonPresidentI am a legally blind senior citizen. I have been legally blind since birth and that has never really hindered or bothered me except for the fact that the agencies think that they, the professionals in the field of working with the blind and or other handicap people know all the answers about us and most of the time, don’t even have a clue. I know this is the thing that makes our, the NFB v rehab centers so successful and so critical for us. What makes this so bad is, especially when you are young, you want to think that the professionals in the field of the blind can really help and you really want someone to take responsibility and tell you how you should act and live your life. This is wrong for anyone. Your life is your responsibility and you have to make up your mind that you will decide how you are going to live it. Even if you want to become a bum, be the best bum that you can be. I was born; November 3, 1943 in a sleepy little town in North East Texas named Bryance Mille Texas. My parents figured out that there was something wrong with my eyes when I was about two and a half years of age. That is when I started wearing glasses. I went to public school and of course Braille was not an option because if I had to strain my eyes to see that was good for me because, as the professionals said this would make my eyes grow stronger. They didn’t, and I didn’t really learn how to read. I had to finally teach myself when in high school I had a girlfriend that wrote notes to me in Braille and I couldn’t read them. I learned that Braille alphabet in one week. Love has a way of doing that. In my junior year of high school I had fully intended on going to college and teaching school. Of course the so-called professionals, in a meeting, told us that there was no reason for us to go to college. It would be better if we got trained in a so-called field for the blind and a lot of us bought that line. I became a masseur, and was halfway successful at it, but I wanted something more. In 1978 my wife and I started running a Randolph Sheppard vending stand San Jacinto Junior College and also when I started going to college to become a teacher. This is when I found the National Federation of the blind. I have to say that the NFB is the best thing that ever happened to me. If I live to be a million years old I will never be able to repay the federation for what they have given me, federation love. I guess you could say, I’m a jack-of-all-trades and master of nothing. I help start the South Texas for the Blind in 1965, taught college computer courses, help form the first union in a lighthouse for the blind, taught adaptive technology, repaired computers, help build houses, done landscaping, and currently I am a supply technician at the Naval Air Station in Meridian, MS. I have been chapter president in Houston, TX, started a chapter in Corpus Christi, TX, and currently the president of the newly formed Meridian Lauderdale county chapter. I have also served on local boards and on national division boards. |
