Author Shares Experiences with Lindy Students

The students of Daniel Street and Harding Avenue elementary schools received a special visit from Beth Finke, author of “Hanni and Beth; Safe and Sound.” 

Finke engaged students with stories of her experience with losing her sight at the age of 25, learning to adapt to life with a disability, and getting around with the help of a seeing-eye dog. Finke shared excerpts from her book, which is told from her previous seeing-eye dog’s perspective. 

She explained how independent blind people can be and answered students’ questions about her book, her blindness, seeing-eye dogs, her talking computer and Braille. She also demonstrated for students the difference between a “working” dog and a dog “off duty” by removing her dog Whitney’s harness and letting students pet her.

“It’s fun to visit school kids because they are really curious…they are not shy about asking questions about everything, and I don’t mind answering them,” Finke said. “It’s why I wrote the book. People are hesitant to ask those with disabilities what life is like for them. I wanted to explain it in a way where people would understand that they can still talk to me on the street – we can be friends and it doesn’t have to hamper anything. I just do things differently.”