Experience of Space

       I had my therapy session on wendsday this week, since they are closed for my usual session on friday. I had thought that it was amazing enough that I was able to put pegs into a rotating peg board using only my weak eye. The peg board has the letters of the alphabet randomly placed at different angles all over the board. The goal is to place the pegs into the board in alphabetical order then take them back out in alphabetical order. I was able to do both using only my weak eye. It was amazing, especially since only a month ago I could not read anything with my weak eye, let alone track moving letters on a spinning board.
       But the most amazing thing that happened in therapy this week happened during a tracking exercise. My therapist holds a gold ball on a silver stick and I follow it with my eyes. He was commenting on how my weak eye no longer jerks when it's tracking something. I could feel the difference, it is somewhat difficult to explain. There used to be this pulling, halting sensation in my left eye when I moved it to look at something. I had not noticed it too much, until it stopped doing it. Now, I can tell a huge difference! This, however, is not the most amazing thing. While my therapist was moving the ball toward and away my face, instead of seeing one and a half balls, like I usually do, the ball turned into one and I had the most bizarre sensation of roundness while looking at the ball, and the room expanded outward from my body. For half a second, I had depth perception.
       For those of you that do not know what it is like to not have depth perception, I want you to take a picture of a room of your house, print it off, then stand in the same spot you took the picture in. Look at the picture, and then look at the room. Without depth perception, I see the room as a flat object, like a picture. It's like standing inside of the picture. You are not part of the picture. You do not fit into the flat space. You are just stuck in the middle of it. Flat pictures surround you as you move through the world. That is the best way that I can describe it.
        For those of you that do not have depth perception, I want you to go into a space that you are familiar with. Preferably a small room, that you can reach around in and touch things. Perhaps a bathroom. Close your eyes and picture the room in your head, slowly reach out. Think carefully about how far you are reaching. How does reaching out to the sink relate to reaching the mirror or wall. Do not use your eyes to tell you what the space looks like. Use only your brain and let it tell you how the things in the space are related to each other. Stay concious of the open space, and how it radiates out from where you are standing. That is the best way I can describe to you what it is like. To see it, is completely different, but to understand the feeling of space that is the only way that I can think to describe it to you.