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In "Dark Harbor," Ved Mehta recounts the challenges
he set for himself building a vacation home on the Maine island
of Isleboro. Mehta, who is blind, was introduced to the island
by a charming, wealthy woman who invited him for vacations at
her summer home on the island where "the air felt fresh as
sweet water." He allowed himself to be lured into buying
property without walking around it. It turned out to be hilly,
marshy and rocky. After several architects and thousands of dollars,
he hired Edward Larrabee Barnes, the architect of the IBM Building,
who began drawing up plans. However, Mehta put the project on
hold because, again impetuously, he had fallen in love with his
future wife. Although often wondering why, Mehta finished the
house and later built an addition, swimming pool and pool house.
Mehta believes he stuck with his venture to "defy the accepted
notion that the blind must keep to their pitiful place."
Instead, he provided his family with things a sighted husband
and father might. Mehta looks at himself humorously and harshly.
He illustrates his envy and pride, and nails down other fleeting
emotions: awkwardness with an attractive woman, panic at being
left alone on the island's runway. "Dark Harbor" is
an exquisitely written book about a seemingly impossible idea
that occurred to a man who is "not one ever to give up on
anything."
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