Impressive

         Last night, Feisty Pants and Goo were watching Antiques Roadshow ('cause we're just gangsta that way) when someone appeared on the show with a painting by Louis Aston Knight (an impressionist).  To which FP got all agog and declared she wanted it. She does seem to have eclectic tastes, that one.  It did not even have glitter or glow in the dark or anything she usually requires to qualify as fine art.  My first thought, was "huh, expensive, but good on you, Kid." Interesting to see her tastes come out.  My second thought, however, was "Holy CRAP- this kid is cortically visually impaired.  What does she see in this?"

         Seriously, we have no true idea of exactly what her vision is like. She is legally blind.  But blindness refers to clarity.  Most people think that blind means the absence of vision. A perpetual darkness, like having a blindfold on.  But blindness is a whole gamut of blurriness and shadows and colors/absence of colors and detail.   In Feisty Pants' case, her eyes work.  Her brain doesn't quite know how to put the pictures together properly.  I have worn goggles that (as near as anyone can tell)  simulate CVI.  It's a wash of colors and shadows but little detail.  Think of looking through hammered glass shower doors.  But her vision is kinda like swiss cheese. Most of it is that blurry hammered glass but in it are small holes (hence the swiss cheese analogy) where her vision is clear.  But for some reason, the holes move.  Also, some new information is coming to light about how people with CVI adapt to it.  (Doctors have finally learned the trick of asking an adult with CVI to best describe the condition. Honestly, sometimes they need to their heads out of their, umm err, books.)  There is a particular tic to people with CVI -they will spot something and then immediately turn their head away. (It's a hallmark of cortical visual impairment, in fact)  Turns out that vision is somewhat like polaroid film.  Your brain takes the picture and then instantly develops it.  It's so fast, you don't realize it's happening.  But with CVI it takes longer. That immediate turn AWAY from what they're looking at, is an unconscious way to avoid any more stimuli so their brain can simply develop the picture it just captured. (The polaroid analogy comes from a man with CVI who now lectures to low vision specialists on what it's like to have CVI)  And since, it's the brain, not the eyes there is some hope to improve the functioning.  

                When FP was an infant, she did not even see the whole color range.  But therapy can and does help this.  So now we know she sees color, shape, and outline.  And movement if it is not too fast.  And the level of "too fast" has improved over the years.  But we still don't know how much detail she has.  Or how her depth perception is. (And depth perception is actually two different kinds of perception, near depth and far depth- one is relates to how the eyes work together, the other is in your brain) Going by her aim at swinging at a medical professional only gets us to a rough guess. (And THAT has improved over time too.)   And she is very talented at what is known as "cognitive mapping" which is knowing where things are by memory. (Like the way you can find your way through your own house in the dark)  Which means sometimes she traversing her world through her mental map as opposed to watching where she is.  And merely asking doesn't work yet. She has always been this way.  This is how she perceives her world.  How would you explain blue to someone who cannot see color at all?

                 So, now I wonder.  What did she like about it?  It was impressionism, for goodness' sake.  CVI kids like high contrast and bright colors and simple line drawings because it is easier for their brains to put the picture together quickly.  They're likely to be more into Haring than Monet.   But she does have those spots of clear vision. And she did tell us about how pretty it was.  Maybe there is more to impressionism than just the picture.  Maybe feelings can be transferred through the art.   

                Or, maybe my little Artemis Fowl was simply impressed by the fact it was expensive and therefore must be awesome, so now she wants it.  I am going to be wondering about this all day.