I can see a very strong light. I can see sunlight. Until I was twelve, I had enough sight to distinguish colors, large objects, to know what things look like. For example, I know what the human form looks like. I'm a theater director. I have a visual imagination, which means I can communicate with my actors in visual terms. Now I've been asked if I could do what I do if I didn't have visual imagination. I simply don't know. One solves problems one has.

Questions about whether I feel particularly alive, or whether I'm having fun, don't really apply. They apply to me the same way as they would to you or anyone else. They don't change because I'm unable to see.

I'm in a position where I can call the shots. It is up to you to communicate with me in a way I can receive the communication. If you sent me a cover letter, I wouldn't have to read it. If (students) want me, they can make it their business to get it in a form where I can read it. I do Braille, recorded tape, computer technology, electronic mail, and now I'm doing voice mail on the telephone. Those are my strategies for hearing with reading.

I am (within) walking distance (from UNH), but it's not a fun walk. I have done it on occasion. It's not an easy walk...the sidewalks are not well marked, traffic is weird, and not every street has a traffic light. It's frankly more anxiety than I care to put up with. The University provides a wonder service called the handyvan."

I call (people with disabilities) damaged. I don't have any patience with this sort of linguistics war, the different opinions for the correct way to refer to damaged people.

I always use an assistant. When I rehearse I can tell you actually where I want you to be and what kind of stance I want you to take. I need a sighted person to describe whether the pictures I'm attempting to create are in fact the pictures I'm getting. Now the plays I direct are always intensely verbal. I must create pleasing pictures.

I don't particularly care what a performer looks like, but I do get a description. An assistant might tell me, well so and so looks wrong for the part. Too tall, too short, too fat, too thin. I used to cast that way. I made dreadful mistakes. I allowed someone else's judgement to color my judgement. I have a very strong idea of what I want from a particular character, a kind of vocal quality, energy, and rhythm.

Most of what's important about the kind of human nature that I deal with in drama can be detected through senses other than sight. Theatre, particularly, has become so narrowly concerned with the physical appearance. It's commercial, trying to sell the perfect body to a society of very imperfect bodies.