Costa Mesa’s Jimmy Vivar sees a bright future ahead

Vivar means “to live” in Spanish, and Jimmy Vivar has done plenty of living in his quarter-century on this Earth.

Vivar, a Costa Mesa resident, was born with an degenerative eyesight condition called Retinitis pigmentosa. He has very little sight, a field of vision that’s like a pinhole, and extreme difficulty seeing at night. He usually walks with a cane.

“Sometimes people ask for percentages,” Vivar said. “I don’t exactly know what the percentage of vision would be, but I do have problems with peripheral vision. Playing sports or Frisbee would be hard, seeing things from further away and coming close into my field of vision. Being able to navigate new areas is also difficult. Figuring out how deep a set of stairs are, or in a new place, where a fire hydrant might be, for example. And if there’s a white fire hydrant and a white building behind it, I’ll probably miss that.”

Still, Vivar has not let his vision difficulties define him. He graduated from Early College High School in the Newport Mesa Unified School District in 2014. Four years later, he graduated from Loyola Marymount University with a degree in civil engineering.

Vivar, 25, currently works for the Los Angeles Department of Transportation as a transportation engineering associate, reviewing potential projects and developments in the city. He’s set to take his professional licensing exam later this month.

Vivar is an alumnus of the Blind Children’s Learning Center, starting in the Santa Ana-based organization’s summer camp program in 2003. Now, he prepares to take a walk to benefit the BCLC.

The Blind Children’s Learning Center is having its annual 5K Destination Independence Walk in a relay format this year, to encourage social distancing during the coronavirus pandemic. The nonprofit organization, which helps children throughout Orange County, hopes to raise $150,000 at the fundraising event. It will be held at Mater Dei High School on April 18.

People can also participate remotely. Vivar said he plans to participate in the walk from Fairview Park, close to his house in Costa Mesa. He might not stop at 5K. He said he could walk up to 10 miles, down the Santa Ana River trail to the Pacific Ocean and back.

“Once things are able to open up again and resume, I’d be more than happy to go back to the center as well and speak if they want me to, talk to the kids and encourage them,” Vivar said. “I want them to know that they shouldn’t let their eye conditions hold them back on what they want to do in life.”

Jimmy Vivar of Costa Mesa, pictured in Fairview Park on March 30, 2021.

(Raul Roa / Staff Photographer)

Vivar, who lives at home with his parents Aaron and Maria, is happy to give back to the place that helped him all the way through high school. He said the BCLC helped him with white cane mobility training as he learned life skills to help him cope with his lack of eyesight.

“Maybe better than cope, to find creative ways to live daily life despite having the disability,” Jimmy Vivar said. “They’ve helped me become more independent, learning to advocate for myself when I have a need. I’m more confident now.”

Vivar likes to sing and play guitar, and earned a brown belt in Aikido martial arts during high school. He is fluent in Spanish and English but also learned Polish for a college class trip to Krakow, Poland, and has dabbled in Italian and French.

BCLC teacher Danette Davis could see that Vivar was motivated. Davis worked with him in 11th and 12th grade, teaching him Braille, she said.

“He is a great guy,” Davis said. “Very smart, very personable, generous, kind, all of those things. He was a hard worker.

“I showed him that braille was math-oriented, and he loves math. It gives him an option. It’s so good to see kids like him make it. There’s so many roadblocks, and he’s just done it.”

More information on the BCLC Destination Independence Walk is available at blindkids.org/walk. Online registration closes April 16.

Vivar said he plans to complete the walk this weekend. If he goes further than 5K, his father definitely won’t be surprised.

“We’re so proud of him, because we know the challenges he’s had,” Aaron Vivar said. “We’ve always encouraged him to do his best. If he thinks he can do it, he can do it.”

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