AUBURN - Bryan Meis knows the city like the back of his hand.

But he hasn't seen either one.

Meis was born with Liebers Disease, a condition that left him blind.

After moving here from a rural community, he's had to learn the town in tow of his trusty tour guide - emphasis on the guide part.

Ross Deforest, a mobility instructor for Aurora of Central New York Inc., leads Meis around the streets, teaching him the city's traffic patterns, bus stops, building entrances and landmarks.

Meis's goal is one most of the people who pass him on the sidewalks take for granted - independence.

With nothing more than a 5-foot white cane and Deforest's instructions, the 21-year-old makes the trek from the downtown bus stop to the Seymour Library.

The team has worked together from time to time over the past three years, but changed the lesson when the venue switched from his rural home in Cato to his new city lifestyle.

Deforest trailed him through the streets of Auburn with three fingertips lightly touching his back pointing out businesses and structures as they passed.

“Ross is a good mobility instructor, I see him all the time at Aurora and we joke back and forth,” Meis said.

While Deforest has use of his eyes, he's knows what Meis is going through - he's done it too.

He wandered the streets of Nacoqdoches, Texas, blindfolded and armed with a cane as part of his training to teach the visually impaired.

“They just dropped me off in the city and blindfolded me and I had to make my way through the city,” Deforest said. “I couldn't just talk the talk, I had to walk the walk, too.”

He teaches Meis to listen to the sounds of traffic to cue him to when he can cross the street. At intersections, he listens to the cars that are closest to him so he will hear the first surge of movement.

“He can hit around this town pretty much anywhere he needs to go,” Meis said.

He also hears echoes off buildings and other obstacles so he can veer away from them.

“People don't realize how subtle our hearing is and blind people rely on and use their hearing so much they tune in to things,” Deforest said. “Those who can see don't develop this. It's like anything, you don't develop it and you don't use it, you don't know it's there.”

In fact, obstacles they frequently encounter are related to Bryan's disability. Their trip to Seymour Library found a lack of Job Access With Speech (JAWS), a computer program that speaks and allows users to use voice navigation.

He will have to go to the Cayuga Community College, which offers the $900 software. Meis aims to enroll there to study communications.

He's just one of the nearly 200 people the Syracuse-based nonprofit agency assisted in getting oriented to their surroundings last year. Trainers from Aurora also work with people in several counties such as Onondaga, Tioga, Cayuga and sections of Seneca. And it helped nearly 800 people through other vision-related programs.

“It can be scary and difficult at first but it gets easier,” Deforest said. “Soon it becomes like second nature.”

Though walking unfamiliar streets still makes Meis a little nervous, it only takes him one trip to remember how to get around.

“Oh, that just comes with age,” Meis responded when Deforest applauded him for picking up routes quickly.

Staff writer Jessica Soule can be contacted at 253-5311, ext 267 or jessica.soule@lee.net