I may on my next fort make every blind dwarf into a legion. A terrifying candy wearing legion with blindfolds over their eyes.
Pretty Zen, dude.
Also has anyone ever seen a blind dwarf get the negative thought "has witnesses death recently"? You'd think they would be impervious to this negative thought. But then again you want your military to see so much death that they revel in it and then eventually don't care about anything anymore.
It says 'witnessed' rather than 'seen', so I think that'd be okay. I guess they just hear their comrades screaming in pain, taste/smell the dwarf blood, maybe if they're like Urist McDaredevil (e.g. other senses are heightened), they can hear the heart stop beating. And of course soon potentially there will be miasma.
Anyway, in regards to OP, I think someone has already mentioned or at least implied this, but getting a sawmill up and running as soon as possible is a good idea, especially when your site has lots of soil layers and/or flux layers you aren't willing to free up for construction. Otherwise you run the risk of piercing a cavern before you're ready to deal with its contents.