Cockeyed (29 page)

I am grateful to the following friends, family, readers, editors, writers, and strangers for helping me realize this book, and its blindness, as my own:

Lane Bergeson and the
Utne Reader;
George Bowering; Mark Cochrane; Wayde Compton; Brad Cran; Michael Davidson; Jennifer, Perry, and Jack Gray; Joanne Hoedemaker; John Hull; Bobby Ixnay; Gillian Jerome; Reg Johanson; Georgina Kleege; Erin Knighton, the Coma Girl; Mykol Knighton, who fixed my pants; Rory Knighton, missed; my parents, Miles and Kathie, who never, ever flinch; the tooth and cure of Jim Knipfel; Jason Le Heup; Ashok Mathur, for the test run at the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design; Don McKellar, who read the first and unforgivably long draft; Stan Persky, for our metaphysical car pool; Paul Pigat, for the riffs between; Helen and Tony Rawa; Eden Robbins; Gary Ross and
Saturday Night Magazine;
the sentences of Oliver Sacks; the revelatory horror of Jose Saramago; Slickity Jim's Chat and Chew, for the soup and space; Scott Smith; George Stanley; Anne Stone; Sharon Thesen and the
Capilano Review;
Will Trump, my first teacher in blindness; Michael Turner; Peter Van Garderen; Karina Vernon; Alana Wilcox and the folks at Coach House
Books; my colleagues at Capilano College, who, for some reason, hired me when my fly was down; the generous and forgiving people at blind camp; and that guy at the pub who told me I needed to take responsibility for bumping into him. Consider it done.

I owe a unique debt, a large tab, to Brian Fawcett at
Dooneyscafe.com
, whose encouragement and curiosity coaxed this book, sentence by sentence, and who first edited me into an understanding of my blindness.

For her spirited advocacy of my writing, not just my story, I am extremely grateful to my agent, Denise Bukowski, and all the folks at The Bukowski Agency.

To my editors, Lisa Kaufman at PublicAffairs and Diane Turbide at Penguin, my awe and thanks for finding rabbits in my hat. My gratitude extends to all the people at both presses for putting their shoulders to this thing.

Much gratitude remains, and I give it all to Tracy Rawa, for her love, patience, friendship, strength, humour, and unrivalled bullshit detection.

PUBLICAFFAIRs is a publishing house founded in 1997. It is a tribute to the standards, values, and flair of three persons who have served as mentors to countless reporters, writers, editors, and book people of all kinds, including me.

 

I. F. STONE, proprietor of
I. F. Stone's Weekly,
combined a commitment to the First Amendment with entrepreneurial zeal and reporting skill and became one of the great independent journalists in American history. At the age of eighty, Izzy published
The Trial of Socrates,
which was a national bestseller. He wrote the book after he taught himself ancient Greek.

 

BENJAMIN C. BRADLEE was for nearly thirty years the charismatic editorial leader of
The Washington Post
. It was Ben who gave the
Post
the range and courage to pursue such historic issues as Watergate. He supported his reporters with a tenacity that made them fearless, and it is no accident that so many became authors of influential,best-selling books.

 

ROBERT L. BERNSTEIN, the chief executive of Random House for more than a quarter century, guided one of the nation's premier publishing houses. Bob was personally responsible for many books of political dissent and argument that challenged tyranny around the globe. He is also the founder and was the longtime chair of Human Rights Watch, one of the most respected human rights organizations in the world.

For fifty years, the banner of Public Affairs Press was carried by its owner Morris B.Schnapper,who published Gandhi, Nasser, Toynbee, Truman, and about 1,500 other authors. In 1983 Schnapper was described by
The Washington Post
as “a redoubtable gadfly.” His legacy will endure in the books to come.

Peter Osnos,
Founder and Editor-at-Large

Copyright © 2006 by Ryan Knighton

Published in the United States by PublicAffairs™,
a member of the Perseus Books Group.

Some names have been changed to protect the innocent.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, address PublicAffairs, 250 West 57th Street, Suite 1321, New York, NY 10107. PublicAffairs books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the U.S. by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 11 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA 02142, call (617) 252-5298, or email [email protected].

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Knighton, Ryan.
Cockeyed : a memoir / Ryan Knighton.
p. cm.

eISBN : 978-1-586-48586-3

1. Knighton, Ryan—Health. 2. Retinitis pigmentosa—Patients—Biography. 3. Blind—Biography. I. Title.

RE661.R45K64 2006
362.197'7350092—dc22
[B]
2005058697