Albino helped me achieve more

　　I was born an albino （白化病人） in Pennsylvania in 1945. No one in my family had ever known what an albino was and what it meant to be an albino.

　　My family and friends treated me like everybody else. That was just about the best thing they could have done. It helped me trust myself, so when troubles came along, I could deal with them.

　　Like most albinos, I had terrible eyesight, but the fact that I could hardly see didn’t bother me that much.

　　Kids would tease me, calling me “Whitey”. People stared at me when I held reading material right at the tip of my nose so that I could see it well enough. Even when I was eight, movie-theatre clerks started asking me to pay full price because I “looked older”.

　　The worst part for me was that because my eyesight was so bad, I couldn’t play sports very well. I didn’t give up trying, though. I shot hoops （投篮） every day. And I studied harder.

　　Eventually, I got better at school and loved it. By the time I got to college, I was double majoring, going to summer school and buying myself with every activity I could find. I had learned to be proud of being an albino. I did my best to make “albino” a positive word. And I decided to make my living with my eyes ― and in sports.

　　I couldn’t see very well to play sports, but with a solid education and a drive to do it, I could make a living involved in the area I loved. I’ve done it now for over thirty years in print and in video, and now in cyberspace. People make jokes about how I’m the only “blind editor” they know, but the jokes are smile, some of them signs of respect.

　　I was just a proud albino kid from the coal country of Pennsylvania. I now realize that being born an albino helped me to overcome difficulties, gain confidence and be proud of my personal achievement.

　　Help:

　　make a living 以......谋生

　　albino: 白化病人

　　shot hoops: 投篮