By Vikki Ortiz Healy, Tribune reporter
Alexander Perez-Vargas maneuvers through the Forest Park streetscape — the barbershop poles, cafe planters and lampposts — like a man who has navigated without sight all his life.
At a busy intersection, he prefers to be guided by humming car engines and the swoosh of traffic rather than a high-pitched noise that beeps the visually impaired toward a talking “walk” button.
“I always like being like that — brave,” Perez, 29, explained later from a room at the Blind Rehabilitation Center at Hines VA Hospital, where he had been living for more than a month.
He is still finding his way, like an increasing number of young veterans who have lost their sight. Perez left his wife and home in Tampa, Fla., to spend weeks at the facility off Roosevelt Road near Maywood.
Since the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Hines has hosted 65 members of the armed forces who served in Iraq and Afghanistan — more than any of the nine other VA blind centers across the country. Since 2005, the influx has more than doubled the number of blind or visually impaired 20- to 39-year-olds who stay for weeks at a time or longer to learn important survival skills, from operating a stove to walking unfamiliar streets, such as the stretch in downtown Forest Park.
