By Judi McLeod
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Losing your eyesight is not a loss of vision. That's the everyday inspirational belief of former USA Navy medic Eric Kallal, who has been the light in the darkness for many.
Before learning, firsthand that eyesight is not always vision, Kallal had to first re-learn how to stand up and walk again.
Having performed reconnaissance operations with the Marine Corps all over the world, the young Navy medic didn't expect anything different in November 2000 when he was conducting a night parachute jump in North Carolina. No winds were forecast for that fateful night, but during the freefall high winds blew Kallal perilously close to a power line. Although he and his parachute never made physical contact with the lines, he apparently caught an arc from a transformer. The electricity was merciless, burning more than 40 percent of his upper body. It was nerve damage that resulted in a loss of vision in his left eye.
And even then, the worst was still to come.
After conquering how to stand up and eventually walk again, the determined medic was on his way to re-enlist.
On the very night before Kallal was to sign the reenlistment papers, he suffered a spontaneous detachment of the retina in his right eye, a delayed result of the parachuting accident. The valiant navy man, given the bad news that surgery was unable to restore his vision, was left totally blind, blind in the sense that he couldn't see anything, including the faces of those he loved most, but never in darkness.
That was back in August of 2003.
"At first, I didn't want to admit it was blindness," Kallal recalled. "I wanted to believe my eyesight would come back."
And it did, in a very significant way called inner vision,
At a crossroad in his life, it was like a drowning man able to grab onto a lifeline when Kallal first established contact with the Blind Vetrerans Association (BVA).
Meeting with other blind veterans and utilizing the wide range of services the BVA offers proved to him that he was not alone. "It has allowed me to see more of how losing your eyesight is not a loss of vision," Kallal told Brett S. Martin of Shakopee, Minnesota.
Thirty-six years old with a wife and two children, Kallal points out that his experience with the BVA has given him the incentive he needed to succeed. "I'm not going to shortchange myself or other blinded vets by not giving at least 110 percent," he said.
Enduring in its outreach, the BVA was originated in 1945 by a group of blind veterans from World War 11. The BVA of today is a community of service men and women who have lost their eyesight. Appropriately based in Washington, D.C., home of the war memorials, BVA proudly boasts more than 10,300 members with 53 affiliates and regional groups across the United States.
There an estimated 150,000 blind veterans nationwide, with approximately 38,000 enrolled in the Veterans Administration (VA).
Sadly, there are many blind veterans who don't know about the BVA and the association would like nothing more than for word to reach each and every one of them.
It's a memory to last a lifetime, when you realize that someone lost to isolation, depression and loneliness has found the way back to the light.
Kallal, who took his first faltering steps in trying to learn to walk again back in 2003, today stands tall as the energetic CEO of a company he launched in September, 2004. His specialized field in biotechnology and information technology services to the United States and its allies, a job he can't wait to start every day.
Government contracts can be long in arriving. So in his spare time, Kallal uses his experience to help other blinded veterans start their own businesses.
One of his first success projects as a blinded veteran were the medical kits he made for disaster procedures--which were used by the Pentagon when it was hit by a jet on September 11, 2001.
If only all could see through Eric Kellal's eyes.
Canada Free Press founding editor Most recent by Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the print media. Her work has appeared on Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, Glenn Beck. Judi can be reached at: judi@canadafreepress.com
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