Gary Kingston
As a blind person, Donovan Tildesley utilizes a talking computer, which features a digitalized voice reading off the screen.
?To someone sighted who hears it for the first time, it sounds rather ridiculous,? says the Paralympic swimmer/golfer/skier/insurance broker/motivational speaker and, most recently, standup comic. ?So one of my jokes has to do with ?How does a blind person look at porn?? And then I imitate this voice reading a [porn] story off the screen.
?It?s a little offensive,? he adds with a laugh. ?It?s like ?Who the hell would go there?? ? Well, as you are about to find out, there are very few places Tildes-ley, a 28-year-old adventurer and ladies? man and a guy with limit-less vision, won?t go.
Double black diamond ski runs. Parachuting out of a plane. A planned hike of Kilimanjaro. Or, a joke about a female insurance agent getting a boob job.
?I work in an office with a bunch of women and I answer the phone a lot of times. We?ll get calls from clients ?Oh, I was speaking to the girl, uh, the smallish, red-headed girl.? ?And I tell them I?ll have to ask around the office. ?I kept asking and no such person worked there.? But then I found out later in the day that my colleague dyed her hair and got breast implants that weekend.?
Now, his act isn?t all blue humour suitable for college campuses and HBO. There is some family-friendly fare. Like the joke about him being a pretty bad kid.
?My parents had to come up with alternate ways of disciplining me,? says Tildesley, who has been blind since birth as a result of being born with-out retinas. ?They couldn?t exactly take away my Nintendo because I didn?t play the damn thing. And I couldn?t watch TV. So, whenever I stepped out of line or did something foolish, they?d go and move the furniture on me.?
Ba-da-boom.
Tildesley, a five-time Paralym-pic medallist in the pool, is about to compete in his fourth Games starting Thursday in London. But for a young man once defined by how fast he could swim without benefit of sight, so much has changed in the four years since he was Canada?s flagbearer during the opening ceremonies at Beijing.
He got a job at Buntain Insurance, went skydiving for his 25th birthday, took up golf, spent seven months in 2011 at the Colorado Centre for the Blind learning independent living and tried his hand at cracking wise on a stage.
All of which means that earning a medal this time around, at what he says will be his last Paralympics, might be tough. He?s not sad about it. It?s just that priorities change. You get older. New challenges await.
?I can?t be an athlete for the rest of my life.?
He was an inspirational, vocal leader in Beijing, extremely honoured that his teammates felt him worthy of being the flagbearer.
?It?s not going to be the same high,? he says of London. ?I?m going to be in a different mind space. Four years ago, swimming was very much my life. I?m not saying it isn?t any more, but I?m at the point in my life right now where I know that winning a medal is no guarantee.
?This Games is icing on the cake. If I can get up on that podium, I?d be ecstatic, but if I can somehow motivate other athletes on my team, other younger swimmers, get them excited to perform to their personal bests, then I will have done some of my job over there.
?The other thing is I?m in the insurance industry now. How can I tie this success in the pool to growing my own book of business? How can being a Paralympian help me to become a better salesman for myself and my company? What can I do with social media to increase that? So I?m looking at it from the holistic experience.?
NEEDS OWN APARTMENT
A preppy looking Tildesley ? a collared shirt, dress shorts and loafers ? is seated at the outdoor patio of a restaurant on Broadway, having just finished lunch with a female colleague from another Buntain office, when we sit down to talk.
He and Christina Cavaco, who is off to a new job in Calgary soon, have known each for three years, but become really good friends in the last few months through extended conversations about their shared passion for sales, people and personal growth.
Cavaco is half-Italian, half-Portuguese and incredibly attractive. And you can?t help but think that it?s a shame that Donovan can?t see this woman. But in a sense he can, just in his own way.
?It seems so funny when he talks about me,? Cavaco says in an interview days later when asked if she believes Donovan appreciates her beauty. ?It makes me feel a little weird, makes me go red. I say ?You can?t see me,? but he says ?I can hear it in the way you talk.?
?With women, he?s not shy at all. He?s obviously blind, but he?ll go up to any lady and start talking to her. He says he can tell by her voice and the smell of her scent if she?s attractive.
?He?s such a great guy to hang out with, just amazing.?
Tildesley, who still lives with his parents in Point Grey, says his only difficulty with women is that he doesn?t have a home of his own for them to take him back to.
He?s looking for a place, but needs one that is close to work and the Arbutus Club pool.
?I have a good feeling that after this Games, this will be the year it happens. Plus, it makes me more marketable to the opposite sex. A guy who lives at home? It?s harder to find dates.?
To prepare for his independence, he spent those seven months at the school in Colorado, although it wasn?t quite what he had expected.
?I went down there expecting to meet blind go-getters who wanted to start their own businesses and wanted to make tons of money. But I met people who had lost their sight later in life who didn?t know what to do, kids who were just out of high school trying to figure their way in life, people with other learning disabilities. I remember getting there the first day and half the people didn?t even know what the Paralympics were. So, it was a rather humbling experience.?
He did learn how to cook ? the final task was cooking a meal for 60 people ? and fell in love with Colorado and its spectacular outdoors. He climbed a 4,200-metre mountain with Eric Weihenmayer, the first blind person to reach the summit of Everest in 2001 and a man who starred last year in the ABC reality show Expedition Impossible.
?Honestly, if I didn?t have a job to come to back here and a Paralympics to train for, I would have stayed in Colorado. While the school wasn?t quite what I expected, I got the life experience and it instilled in me this new confidence and this greater appreciation for the world around me and helped me to feel more comfortable in my new skin.?
On his return, he joined friend Amber Weland ? ?one of the most naturally funny people I know,? he says ? at a comedy show at the Fray on Fraser last December. ?We kind of turned to each other and said these guys suck and she says ?you and me in 2012, we?re going to put on some shows.? ? Weland and Tildesley, by the way, met a few years back at a Board of Trade function when she offered him her elbow as he was getting out of a taxi.
?We became fast friends from there,? says Weland. ?That day, he ended up sort of trash-talking me into doing a day of skiing with him up at Whistler. I?m a pretty good snowboarder and he often leaves me behind. I tell him he makes a great ski buddy. With him, I can get up in the morning and not have to do my hair or put on mascara. As long as I put on deodorant, I?m okay.?
One night last February, Tildesley beat out a dozen other budding comics at the Fray ? ?I guess I had a lot of friends out that night who drank a lot of drinks? ? winning $100 and a chance to perform in the finals at the Edgewater Casino. He didn?t win and has been a bit too busy recently to get back on stage, but hopes to find some time after the Paralympics. ?I?m constantly trying to think of new material that?s not too offensive.?
Tildesley, who has a BA in English literature from UBC, was set to take a job with RBC in the Visa call centre after Beijing when his family?s neighbour, Gordon Buntain, suggested he come work for him and help develop his company?s travel medical insurance.
It hasn?t been easy ? finding adapt-able software, dealing with potential roadblocks put up by regulatory agencies. But the blunt-spoken, high-energy Buntain has backed Tildesley at every step.
?I told him ?you can do anything you wish, but let?s dream big,? ? said Bun-tain. ?Yes, there?s going to be hurdles, but I?ll support you.?
Tildesley says it has been challenging. ?But over time, I?ve figured out that I have a passion for sales. I absolutely love people and building relationships, getting to know them and helping to solve their problems.?
?IN THE BEST SHAPE POSSIBLE?
Tildesley took up golf a few years ago. He hasn?t played as much as he?d like, but this spring, Buntain sponsored a hole at a fundraising tournament for Donovan?s old school, St. George?s.
?Basically, it was a longest drive com-petition,? says Tildesley. ?I would get up and hit a shot and people would try to hit their ball past mine. It was called Beat the Blind Guy.?
Utilizing a sighted guide, Tildes-ley loves ripping down the slopes at Whistler, but says he has no interest in becoming a Winter Paralympian.
?Gates scare the hell out of me. Ski-ing?s like my therapy. I like to go up to the alpine and cut down the steepest and the deepest. I?d be worried that taking it on as a serious sport would take the fun out of it for me and I need that in my life.?
But in the next breath, he says with a big smile, ?You know what I think would be a good sport? Blind ski cross. Imagine a bunch of blind guys going through a gate and all trying to stay on course and not run into each other.?
In London, Tildesley, who competes in the S11 class with other totally blind swimmers, will race the 100-metre butterfly, the 100 backstroke, 100 freestyle and 200 individual medley.
He owns freestyle world records at 800 and 1,500 metres, but those distances aren?t contested at the Paralympics. In Beijing, he earned bronze at 400 metres and was fourth in the 100. He was also fifth in the 100 backstroke and seventh in the 100 butterfly.
Spaniard Mohamed Enhamed won four gold in Beijing, two in world record time. He is back, as are key competitors from Ukraine, China and Argentina. There is also a strong new-comer from the U.S. in Brad Snyder, who was blinded last September while serving in Afghanistan and who had captained the Naval Academy swim team in his senior year.
?I think I?m in the best shape possible,? says Tildesley. ?Am I as spry as I was four years ago, eight years ago? Maybe not. But I?ve done the work. I?ve put in the metres. I?ve just got to decide in my own head that I can stand up and race as fast as I can and get myself on the podium.?
He says he?ll probably swim for one more year after the Paralympics, go to one more world championships. Then, he?d like to give back to the sport by serving on some athlete councils.
?I think a lot can be done for advocacy in the sport. I wish there was a way to get more blind people involved in sport because it?s really done so much for my life. It?s not only physically and mentally beneficial, but it?s opened so many doors.
?I wouldn?t be the person I am today, have the friends I do today without my involvement in sport and the confidence it?s instilled in me.?
gkingston@vancouversun.com
Source: http://o.canada.com/2012/08/27/for-paralympian-donovan-tildesley-vision-means-seizing-day-blind-swimmer-with-five-medals-at-three-games-isnt-afraid-of-challenges-at-work-personal-life/
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Public release date: 30-Aug-2012
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