Awakin Call

*** Please note the special day for this event -- the call falls on Sunday, instead of our usual Saturday time.  When Zachary Shore was a sophomore at the University of Pennsylvania, he called his parents to tell them he was dropping out. Legally blind by age 16, his vision had continued to deteriorate, and he found himself socially isolated, fearful, and debilitated by eye strain. After an encounter on campus with a fellow blind student who had just returned from a solo excursion with seeming ease, Zach had a moment of awakening: “My problem wasn’t my blindness. It was my lack of skills and confidence.” He would indeed come to find a remarkable set of skills and confidence — eventually earning a doctorate from Oxford University, becoming a distinguished scholar of international conflict and an author of six books, and traveling to more than 30 countries, many of them as solo journeys. Zach credits his strong sense of self to the nurturance of his parents. But his abil