If you had asked me as a lit­tle girl what my favourite time of year was, I would have an­swered with­out hes­i­ta­tion: Ju­ly and Au­gust. Those two months seemed to last for­ev­er, and I loved every minute of them.

Every Ju­ly 3 was a date my broth­er and I looked for­ward to be­cause it usu­al­ly meant one thing. One of our cousins was fly­ing in from the Unit­ed States with her chil­dren, and we knew that once they ar­rived, the house would be­come loud­er, live­li­er and a lot more fun. The days that fol­lowed were filled with games, laugh­ter and all the ex­cite­ment that came with hav­ing fam­i­ly to­geth­er.

I al­so spent a lot of time at my grand­moth­ers’ hous­es. At the time, those vis­its nev­er felt like any­thing spe­cial. It was sim­ply part of my va­ca­tion. I would spend time with fam­i­ly, en­joy what­ev­er was hap­pen­ing that day and think noth­ing of it. Look­ing back now, I re­alise how spe­cial those mo­ments re­al­ly were. They were or­di­nary then, but to­day they are some of the mem­o­ries I trea­sure most.

Every va­ca­tion seemed to bring some­thing dif­fer­ent. There were beach house week­ends with close fam­i­ly friends, sum­mer camps at the School for the Blind, field trips and plen­ty of op­por­tu­ni­ties to spend time with oth­er chil­dren.

One year, I at­tend­ed a two-week self-de­fence camp where I was the on­ly blind par­tic­i­pant. We ex­er­cised un­til we were ex­haust­ed, learnt self-de­fence tech­niques, vis­it­ed the Lopinot Riv­er, went rock climb­ing in an in­door gym and even hiked the trail at Mac­queripe. At no point did I stop to think that I was the on­ly blind per­son there. I was just hav­ing fun.

Then there was the sum­mer of 2011, when I trav­elled to To­ba­go to at­tend Camp Can Do. I met young peo­ple from across the Caribbean, but if you asked me what I re­mem­ber most about that week, my an­swer prob­a­bly would not be what you ex­pect­ed.

Some­where dur­ing that camp, I com­plete­ly fell in love with hors­es. I still re­mem­ber get­ting home and ex­cit­ed­ly telling my moth­er, “Mom, I fell in love with a horse!” To this day, I could not tell you ex­act­ly what it was about that horse, but I re­mem­ber how ex­cit­ed I was.

That same sum­mer, my cousin vis­it­ed Trinidad with her son for the very first time. He was on­ly about two months old, and some­how I end­ed up feed­ing him. I was con­vinced I was go­ing to do some­thing ter­ri­bly wrong. I re­mem­ber think­ing, “What if I put the bot­tle in his nose in­stead of his mouth?” Ap­par­ent­ly, I did a de­cent enough job be­cause by the sec­ond feed­ing, my cousin was hap­pi­ly eat­ing on the oth­er side of the room while I fed her ba­by. Look­ing back now, I can­not help but laugh at how ner­vous I was.

As I think about those sum­mers now, I re­alise I was in­cred­i­bly for­tu­nate. At the time, I wasn’t think­ing about mak­ing mem­o­ries. I was sim­ply en­joy­ing my va­ca­tion and ex­cit­ed to see what each new day would bring. It was on­ly years lat­er that I un­der­stood just how much those or­di­nary days had be­come some of the hap­pi­est mem­o­ries of my child­hood.

This week, while teach­ing Braille to one of my stu­dents, I asked how her va­ca­tion was go­ing.

“It’s good,” she replied.

“Are you do­ing any­thing fun?”

“No. I’m just at home.”

There was noth­ing wrong with her an­swer. Every child de­serves the op­por­tu­ni­ty to re­lax and en­joy a break from school.

Still, our con­ver­sa­tion made me think about my own child­hood and how full those Ju­ly and Au­gust va­ca­tions had been. They were full be­cause I was sur­round­ed by peo­ple who loved me, en­cour­aged me to try new things and made me feel like I be­longed.

Thank­ful­ly, blind and vi­su­al­ly im­paired chil­dren to­day al­so have op­por­tu­ni­ties to cre­ate mem­o­ries of their own.

Here at the Trinidad and To­ba­go Blind Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion, chil­dren can par­tic­i­pate in Braille, in­for­ma­tion tech­nol­o­gy and mu­sic class­es dur­ing the va­ca­tion, and over the years the as­so­ci­a­tion has al­so or­gan­ised va­ca­tion camps.

Chil­dren who en­joy sports can ex­plore ac­tiv­i­ties such as goal­ball, while some blind and vi­su­al­ly im­paired peo­ple have al­so had the op­por­tu­ni­ty to try sail­ing. Chil­dren have dif­fer­ent in­ter­ests, and some may en­joy sports, mu­sic, tech­nol­o­gy or sim­ply spend­ing time with friends and fam­i­ly.

Not every last­ing mem­o­ry comes from a camp or an or­gan­ised ac­tiv­i­ty. Some of the best ones are made while spend­ing time with grand­par­ents, play­ing with cousins, vis­it­ing friends, try­ing some­thing for the first time or sim­ply shar­ing a laugh with the peo­ple we love. Those mo­ments may seem or­di­nary while they are hap­pen­ing, but they of­ten be­come the ones we re­mem­ber most.

As adults, we spend a lot of time prepar­ing chil­dren for the fu­ture. We en­cour­age them to do well in school, learn new skills and be­come as in­de­pen­dent as pos­si­ble. Those things are im­por­tant, but child­hood is hap­pen­ing now.

Years from to­day, these chil­dren may not re­mem­ber every Ju­ly and Au­gust va­ca­tion, but they will re­mem­ber how those va­ca­tions felt. They will re­mem­ber the peo­ple who made them laugh, the places they vis­it­ed, the things they tried and the mo­ments that made them feel in­clud­ed.

When I think back on my own child­hood, I don’t just re­mem­ber what I did. I re­mem­ber how those ex­pe­ri­ences made me feel.

My hope is that to­day’s blind and vi­su­al­ly im­paired chil­dren will one day look back on their own child­hood sum­mers with that same fond­ness, re­mem­ber­ing not on­ly the things they did, but the mem­o­ries they made along the way.

This col­umn is sup­plied in con­junc­tion with the T&T Blind Wel­fare As­so­ci­a­tion.

Head­quar­ters: 118 Duke Street, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad

Email: ttb­wa1914@gmail.com

Phone: (868) 624-4675

What­sApp: (868) 395-3086