Kicking it up a notch
`I realized you have two choices: Lie down and let life pass you by. Or stand up and participate'

Life threw Harry Titus a few punches, including blindness, so he fought back. And he won

GEORGE GAMESTER Toronto Star June 2005

Listen, there's this Karate Kid we want you to meet.

Sure, we know you're really not into the Jackie Chan kung-fu stuff.

But this Toronto guy, Harry, will knock you out. Not with his hands. With his heart.

And with his remarkable life, punctuated by hammer blows that would shatter make-believe movie heroes like Steven Seagal and Jean-Claude Van Damme.

So join us now, as we view some action scenes from The Life of Harry — an inspirational true-life drama unfolding right here in our own backyard...

Scene I, FALL

Just back from a fun trip to Vegas, Harry Titus is ambling through the airport when he takes a bad step and stumbles.

Whoa! There he goes. After flailing down a flight of 17 concrete stairs at Pearson's old Terminal One, Harry wonders for a moment if he's had a miraculous escape.

Stunned, he reaches down to feel his leg — and finds jagged bone protruding from his thigh. "Uh-oh!" he mutters through clenched teeth. "We have a problem."

So what else is new? Harry's had loads of problems since he was 7 years old, starting with those nasty cases of mumps and chicken pox Mom blamed for triggering his juvenile diabetes.

Yes, with his father dying young, the family printing business folding and Harry losing jobs because of his poor eyesight, things seemed bad.

By age 22, the ravages of diabetes have left Harry in the dark. Completely blind.

At the CNIB, a well-meaning caseworker introduces him to an older woman who's been sightless for a long time.

"I was led by the hand into a room where she was sitting in the dark, listening to a radio. That, she told me, was about all she'd been doing for years.

"She scared me. How could she be so passive? It was then I realized you have two choices: Lie down and let life pass you by. Or stand up and participate."

Which he does, with a vengeance. Learning Braille and other coping skills, mastering a two-year computer course in 10 months, finding rewarding work as a top computer technician at Sears.

Who knows? Maybe he could someday find a way to compete again in the sports he loves best: Golf and martial arts.

Scene II, RISE

We're with Team Canada in the Budokan stadium in Okinawa for the 1997 world Goju karate championships.

In the stands, 10,000 devotees of the highest, most revered form of martial arts.

Presiding from the dais, the respected and beloved grandmaster of the sport, Sensei Eiichi Miyazato.

On stage, 1,500 world-ranked black belt champions from 57 nations — including Harry Titus of Scarborough. How could a blind man with a shattered leg have come so far?

Three years he takes to recover from that fall. Multiple surgeries, bone grafts, screws, steel plates, complications, wheelchairs. No wonder his body deteriorates. Who could blame him for surrendering to despair.

But he never lies down. Nor does he abandon his goal of flowing with the mainstream of life. As soon as he's able, he's back into karate.

"When Harry first came to see me," recalls ninth-degree black belt Ron Yamanaka of Markham, "his body was very weak." But his spirit and will are strong.

Working with Ron, the world's highest-ranked Goju instructor and a busy Justice of the Peace at Old City Hall, Harry spends two years rehabilitating body and soul. Quite an achievement — but only the beginning.

Because he has reconstructed his personality as well. Once a diffident type, he's a social animal now — performing so comfortably in mentoring roles with youngsters at Yamanaka's Budolife Centre that it often takes newcomers a while to realize he's blind.

So when Sensei Miyazato asks which of the assembled black belts in Okinawa feels ready to compete for the world championship, Harry raises his hand.

The master is astonished. "Are you sure?" he asks. Harry responds: "I want to participate."

"I had to turn away," recalls Yamanaka. "I had tears in my eyes."

Tears of joy, as it turns out. Because, with no special allowances for his disability, the blind guy from Scarborough finishes in the top 40 per cent of all competitors, earns a 10-minute standing ovation and becomes a media sensation across Japan.

Scene III, LOVE

About time we got to Bev.

When did they meet? Must have been late '92 when insurance broker Beverly Dodds tells a dating service rep she has no objection to socializing with a guy with disabilities.

"Harry gave new meaning to the expression `blind date,' she recalls. "From the moment we met, I knew he was the one.

"He was sitting on a bench at Fairview Mall waiting for me. What I saw was a man with a warm, open and accepting expression. The kind of guy I knew I could really talk to."

And boy, do they talk. All through dinner and for three hours on the phone next day, learning how they'd been born six days apart in June of '57, grew up in the same Sheppard-Bathurst neighbourhood, shared similar interests, tastes and passions.

When they marry a year later, neither suspects how serious the challenges will be.

Even when his Okinawa performance makes him the world's highest-ranked blind karate black belt, Harry knows his kidneys aren't working well.

And sure enough, he winds up on dialysis back home, with Bev cheerfully managing all the paraphernalia. But when doctors examine him as a kidney-transplant candidate, there's a nasty surprise.

Without realizing it, 44-year-old Harry's had a heart attack. With his coronary vessels seriously blocked, he needs bypass surgery to save his life.

Will he now have to forego the possible kidney transplant? "We'll see," say the doctors.

In January 2001, he has the quadruple bypass surgery. The following year, he undergoes a kidney-pancreas transplant.

Four months later, he's "very gently" back into karate at the club, where his buddies give him a new nickname: "Zipper Chest."

How does he do it? The physical, mental and spiritual discipline of his martial arts training are a big part of it.

Scene Fore! GOLF

You've heard of golf handicaps? Now we're ambling around Markham's Parkview Course with a guy who gives new meaning to that term.

Yes, Harry plays golf — with a little help from his friends. But, just like sighted golfers, the intermediate champ of the Ontario Visually Impaired Golfers association still isn't satisfied with his game.

"My goal is to play bogey golf," he vows.

And never mind breaking 100. With on-course guidance from Bev, an aiming device invented by a golf instructor friend and his natural athletic skill, he's already done that.

"Mind you," reveals Bev, "it gets a little scary when Harry drives the cart."

All sounds pretty "normal," doesn't it? A loving husband who looks after the family finances, does the vacuuming, handles the gardening, helps with the dishes, takes care of his guide dog, Target, shovels the walk, teaches kids, plays computer poker, raises funds for disaster relief — and sometimes gets annoyed.

When a bank manager asks him if he's capable of signing his name.

Or someone tries to cheat him making change, claiming a $5 bill is a $10. Or people assume he can't function fully in society.

"It's so much easier for everyone," he says, "when people simply focus on the person, rather than the disability."

Wise words. But, like the man says...

That's just Harry — being Harry.