Librarian sees kindness despite losing vision

After losing her sight nine years ago, Colleen Cote has had to make many adjustments in her life. But there is one constant she’s grateful has never changed.
A librarian at St. Francis School here for the past 13 years, Cote admits she initially was worried that she would lose her job when she lost her sight.
“When I went blind in 1993, I really was not sure if I would still be able to do my job,” she noted last week. “Since I was having doubts, I thought that the school board would also have doubts, but I really could not have been more wrong.
“Employing someone who is blind is not an easy thing,” Cote added. “Yet not one person treated me different. In fact, they told me that when I was ready, my job would be waiting for me.”
In an effort to make Cote’s job easier, St. Francis recently installed a book-scanning computer that says aloud the name of each book when it is passed under a bar code reader.
“This machine has been very helpful to me,” she noted. “With a computer like this, there are a lot of things that I am still able to do.
“Of course, there are some things I need help with but I have a wonderful group of volunteers that help me and the staff at the school have been very supportive,” she enthused.
With so many people ready to help, Cote even has been able to make some of her students doubt her blindness now and again.
“The other day, I had a volunteer come in and straighten up the books in the library,” she recalled. “When one of my classes came into the library, I told them to try and keep it as clean as it was at that time.”
“There was one little girl who seemed stunned by my comments,” she added. “She went up to [the teacher] and asked if I was really blind. When the teacher told her that I was, the little girl asked, ‘How can you be sure?’”
Although her sight loss forced Cote to re-evaluate her life and what is most important, she believes her condition has given her the opportunity to truly witness how generous and kind people can be.
“When I found out that I was going to lose my sight, I decided that I had to make some mental pictures of places and people so I had them when I could no longer see them,” she said.
“I went through my memory and got rid of all the memories that I didn’t need and replaced them with ones I would always want to have.
“Since going blind, I have had nothing but kindness poured out to me from everyone I meet,” she continued. “You wonder how people are going to treat you and then they act like nothing happened and you are very relieved.”
Of all the difficulties Cote has had face–and overcome–since becoming blind, it’s the simple tasks she used to take for granted.
“One of the first things I thought about when I was told I would go blind was how I was going to do my hair and makeup,” she noted. “So while I still had vision in one eye, I taught my husband, Ray, how to do my hair and apply my makeup.”
“For two weeks he learned how to do my hair,” she added. “He has done so well that I get more compliments since he started doing it than when I did.”
While there have been many difficult times, Cote has remained optimistic–and never forgets to see the humorous side of even the most trying situation.
“I was curling my hair one day before school,” Cote said. “I went to unplug it and hit my nose against the dresser. At first I didn’t think it was bad but then I felt blood running down my cheek.
“I ran into the bathroom to look in the mirror and then remembered I couldn’t see.
“When my ride came to pick me up, I asked her if the cut needed stitches,” Cote laughed. “She told me that it was fine. When I got to work and walked into the staff room, the first person I met asked what I had done and told me it looked awful.
“When I called Ray, he asked me how it was, [and] I told him it was somewhere between fine and terrible.”
Grateful to have been given the chance to return to her job, Cote believes it was the prayers of her young students that helped her get back on her feet and return to the work she loves.
“God has given me some wonderful people in my life,” she stressed. “When I was in the first stages of going blind, the staff and children prayed for me.
“It was those prayers that carried me through–and continue to carry me even today.”