Our discussion on Friday about Nancy Mairs' essay titled "Disability" had strongly reminded me about some disabled students at Troy High. I will briefly write about one of these disabled students, Ann.* I do not exactly know what type of disability Ann has, but I can describe what I know about her condition. She seems to be unable to move most of her limbs, which forces her to ride in a wheelchair. When she talks, her words are slightly challenging to understand since her mouth is partially paralyzed (which I concluded from my observations, but I don't know for sure). When I first saw Ann, I thought "Oh dear, what a poor, crippled girl!" I later regretted saying that statement in my mind. The reason why is that I wasn't viewing Ann as an ordinary human at the time (even though I thought that I did so at that moment). I was perceiving Ann as a helpless "cripple" (Mairs 14). I realized this former perception when I read Mairs' statement of how she is "not... Ms. MS, a walking, talking embodiment of a chronic incurable degenerative disease" (14). That sentence made me feel that I was amorally discriminating against Ann (and other disabled people) by saying "It must be terrible to live with disabilities!" Thanks to Mairs, I now know that in order to treat disabled people as ordinary, I will have to behave as if the disabled people I meet have no disabilities. (I am not saying that I will make a lie that disabled people do not have disabilities).
I know that I could have written a fictional narrative about a person with disabilities instead of mentioning Ann, but I am not qualified to write such a story. That is because I am not disabled, so I wouldn't completely understand how disabled people would feel. While it is true that I some idea of disabled people's emotions, I would have to be disabled myself to get the true understanding. I can find a way to give myself a disability, but I am not willing to do that.
*Names of Troy High School students have been changed, so don't bother looking up any names in the yearbook.
