Roy Sassi listened to Governor Carcieri’s speech Wednesday night. There were parts of it that hit close to home. And home, for Sassi, is a very big part of who he is.

He has lived in the three-bedroom ranch on Rawlinson Drive in Coventry since his hard-working father, Armando, bought it in 1960 for $11,800 after the rent on the house in the West End of Providence soared to $150 a month. He grew up there with his sisters and brother. Now, six years after his father’s death and with his mother, Albina, in Riverview Nursing Home, he moves through its familiar rooms alone.

He remembers well the time his mother realized that her degenerative bone disease and other problems meant she would have to go to a place where she could get full-time care. She sat down with her son to prepare him to be the keeper of the family home.

“She gave me a list,” says Roy.

The list covered the basics: Take care of the house; lock the doors; keep it neat and clean; be careful who you let in; live your life and be good to yourself.

It has been four years since he got the list. The house is spotless. Roy locks the doors, takes care with visitors and is doing his darnedest to follow his mother’s other piece of advice. He is trying to live his life and be good to himself.

“I need to stay here,” he says as he sits at his kitchen table. “It is not cost-effective for the state to intervene.”

He needs this modest house for the independence it gives him, for the safety and security. It is where he listens to his music and tends his garden out by the marigold tree in the backyard and taps into a good network of friends. It is where he follows politics and gets upset in the process. It is where he set up his ham radio operation and where he continues a constant connection that started a long time ago.

“When I was five, I couldn’t play like other kids. Radio was my niche. My mother always had it on.”

He remembers the voices — Sherm Strickhouser, Charlie Jefferds, Jim Mendes, Bruce Williamson.

He is 60 years old and has been blind since birth. And he has spent a lot of years making sure his disability does not dictate his life.

“I had to have a good education, so I would not end up blind with no skills. You put a lot of pressure on yourself. I’m a perfectionist.”

His first school was the Perkins School for the Blind, in Watertown, Mass. It was a time when Rhode Island public schools had yet to place students with disabilities in regular classrooms. He came home on the weekends.

He didn’t like Perkins, and by the ninth grade he told his parents he needed a change. By that time, the Rhode Island Department of Education was looking for ways to avoid expensive out-of-state placements by mainstreaming disabled students.

Roy went to Coventry High School. With Braille books, a Braille writer, audiocassettes and good teachers he found his hometown school a good fit.

Then, it was on to Rhode Island Junior College, then to Boston College. Boston College, he says, was his first “real world” experience. He was away from home. Socially, it was tough. But he got his degree in psychology, then a master’s in education. He remembers taping lectures, then editing them in his dorm room. His school days were longer than others’.

He brought his master’s degree back to Coventry where he worked as an administrative liaison with the special-education department. Then he became a counselor — drug counseling, marriage counseling.

“Mostly private agency work,” says Roy.

And after 23 years of helping other people through their bad times, he admits he was close to burnout.

Now, he heads for Riverview Nursing Home as often as he can to visit his mother, the woman he calls his cornerstone. He has become a volunteer there. He spreads his funny, caring self around. He talks to the residents.

“A lot of them don’t have family or friends,” he says.

As a blind man, he gets help. Some of it is from good friends, who drive him places. He appreciates the people at his local Stop & Shop who help him make his grocery selections. He takes his bills to Centreville Savings Bank, where members of the staff make sure they’re paid on time.

He gets $14 a month in food stamps.

He wants to get the help he needs and no more. That is very important. It’s what made some of the governor’s comments resonate in a small corner of Coventry Wednesday night. He does not want to become part of a program.

“I make every effort to be as self-sufficient and independent as I can,” says Roy.

“Don’t smother me, help me.”

Last week, he met with town officials about the house. He sees the house as his parents’ legacy and he needs to do some things to make sure a Sassi remains the owner. He needs to clear up a tax lien and get the house put in his name. He says he has already arranged a second mortgage at Centreville Savings.

There is something very wrong if Roy Sassi does not get to stay in that house full of memories on Rawlinson Drive.

bkerr@projo.com