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Listen to a narrated version of the story below
There was once a time when losing your sight meant the loss of independence.
It was this shared struggle that brought a group of vision impaired people - focused on educating and supporting each other - together 47 years ago.
Now, in 2019, the group has decided to disband. It's a bittersweet end for the group. One on hand, technology has advanced to a point where vision loss isn't such a barrier to independence for young people, but on another, it also means the group has not had anyone join for many years and its necessity has waned.
I sat down with the Mudgee Vision Impaired Friendship Group at their final get together to hear from its remaining members about what the group meant to them and how it changed their lives for the better.
I told her the other day - 'you were a star, you know'.
- Rachel Knowles
The early years
It was 1972 and Mary Lovett was beginning to lose her sight. The seeds of the group were planted thanks to the Lion's Club who thought there should be more done for people like Mary.
"The real reason we formed was because I was losing my sight. The Lion's Club involved the Royal Blind Society - as it was in those days - and so they came to visit me several times," Mary said.
"They found they really couldn't do anything for me before I lost my sight, it was just something that was taking its time,"
"But I knew I had so much to offer, so I said to them 'well, why don't we have a group here. Why don't we do all these things?' So we went back to Lion's Club and they decided 'ok well we'll do it.'"
And they've been involved ever since.
"We formed a group with all the Lion's Ladies, who probably were then all in their 40s. Now we're all getting a bit older, but I mean, all the way through it's been Lion's Club that's kept us together," Mary said.
"It didn't matter what we needed, they always supported us. In the latter years when we couldn't do very much at all, they were excellent. They looked after anything we couldn't manage ourselves like tables and chairs and picking up and dropping off things."
While I was talking to the group, I was joined by other members, past and present, including Jenny Roberts, Rachel Knowles, Graham Hedrick, Elizabeth Gould, Eileen Csuba, Tom Cooke, Gloria Webster and Robert Hughes who each have played their part over the decades.
Volunteer Secretary since 1997, Rachel Knowles described some of the things the group had done together - handing me a four-page document exhaustively listing every guest speaker, outing and event they've participated in.
"We've been to the Lavender Farm, we've had picnics in the park, we went bowling in bathurst, we've had who knows how many guest speakers come from all around Australia," Rachel said.
Rachel then pointed across the table.
"Eileen has taken Mary to all the states in Australia to various vision conferences and meetings. Eileen was just amazing, I told her the other day when I invited her 'you were a star, you know'."
There were no guide dogs, nothing. So eventually it just became them, left alone to be in their mind.
- Rachel Knowles
Tech gets better
Graham Hedrick, who is also part of the Blind Citizens Australia advocacy group, said the rapid pace of technology has changed the way people like him live their lives.
"20-odd years ago, you found that people came to our group for information, for support. Now new inventions come along so people, while they may be blind, they're more sighted than the sighted are," Graham laughed.
"They have this invention where you can go into the supermarket and it tells you what's on the shelves and how much it is. It's pretty amazing."
Rachel then pointed out that Graham often travels to the coast to see his mother, no worries.
"If you go way, way back you'd have families that were made up of two people. One would have lost their sight through an accident or something else. Their carer would go to work and they often stayed at home," Rachel said.
"There were no guide dogs, nothing. So eventually it just became them, left alone to be in their mind,"
"Then all of a sudden things started to happen and the door was opened and once it was, then people no longer said 'he's blind, poor thing' it was more like 'forget about me, kiddo'." I look at Graham, he goes on the train and travels up and down the coast a few times a year. Doesn't think anything of it."
It's never been about just one person. It's always been a collection of people putting the whole thing together.
- Mary Lovett
Looking back
Everyone in the group agreed that they fought hard through the years to make Mudgee a better place to live for the blind. "We were instrumental - along with the Access Committee - in getting all the access tiles you find around Mudgee. We did lots of things, we tried to get the bikes off the footpath for a while," Mary said.
"I will tell you - and this is the honest truth - Mudgee is the most accessible town."
"At one stage, we sent so many letters to the government they'd come back and address me directly. I bet they were thinking down there 'oh damn, it's her again'. We really pushed them to fix up a lot of things," Rachel said.
The future
Will the group still catch up? How does it feel to say goodbye? "I'm not sure, we will give it a few months and see what happens," Graham said.
"I don't think this is a good thing, it's just probably an inevitable thing. You know, it's quite a sad thing, but all good things come to an end as they say. Sadly this group has come to its end. There's no younger people coming through anymore."
One thing Mary wanted everyone to know was that help is never far away and it takes a community to make it work. "All these services are available to people and they often don't know that this stuff is available. Give Vision Australia a ring and they will even come and assess you," Mary said.
"It's never been about just one person. It's always been a collection of people putting the whole thing together,"
"It's been a really good group."