Martha and Jerry. Photograph courtesy of the author.

I find myself thinking often of community these days in an era of polarization and intolerance by so many people for anyone who is different. I am fortunate to feel part of multiple smaller communities, but I am above all a member of the human community.

As much as some of my deepest emotional and strengthening moments are those when I am alone with birds in the cathedral of nature, I always yearn for connection to other people. I am ecstatic when I correctly identify a bird song that initially perplexed me, a satisfying individual achievement. But I am most joyous when I connect deeply with someone else, where the line between us blurs, where we move in harmony with each other, and where we feel, hear, and see each other profoundly.

That is the human community I seek. In this spirit, I thought of how to connect two communities I care deeply about—the blindness and birding communities. After reading a late October 2024 story in the Washington Post about a Michigan birder who is blind, I wondered how many birders who are blind are out there. I personally knew of only a few others in the country. What could I do to find out? How could I help connect people who were blind or had low vision with experienced birders, blind or sighted, to introduce them to the joys of birding or to assist them with exploring the prime birding locations in their area?