October 29 Disabilities Awareness Item

Hi Friends

So here’s the deal: I am feeling uncharacteristically attentive to thoughts of different people’s speaking and learning styles and posting here an assortment of links. Of course as far as disability awareness lifetime rather than disability awareness month and having further conversations that speak to us as a community, having everyone on different pages may or may not be helpful, but here we are.

To be honest, for me sometimes it is a lot easier to talk about something from our culture than something specific on my own mind, so I would be really pleased if Friends have anything to say in person about any of the items here. One topic I am pretty used to explaining different things about in person is my white cane, why I decided to start using it, some really clear benefits from doing so, some things that are really different for me than for other people who also use white canes, why I sometimes refer to my cane as Thwack or Ambassador Thwack. So feel free to ask.

This blog is by a Quaker cartographer. Somewhere on my Quaker blog I saved an interesting link about how people got around before there were visual maps. It mentions some books that sound interesting Maybe when I have time either to think systematically about how some people I know deal with spatial issues or for more conversations with blind people about different ways people get around, I will look up the titles. In the meantime, this item is interesting in itself and it has a link to a video of a British psychiatrist about localization of different activities in different parts of the brain.
http://maphead.blogspot.com/2011/10/feelings.html


Here is the PBS web page for Lives Worth Living, the documentary that aired Thursday night. I have not had a chance either to watch the documentary OR to read comments here, but perhaps Friends will find it interesting.
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/lives-worth-living/



And then there is South Park and Crip fights. This video is toward the LESS tasteless end of the South park vernacular. For one thing I do not recall hearing the F word even once.
Jimmy and Timmy join the crips:
http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/104357/crips-4-life

Topical themes: born vs late in life, fitting in, people having NO CLUE what language means.

Next, thinking about ways people get around and the people one meets and where one might or might not feel specific Quaker calls, some items about my experiences aboard Metro:

Here is an, um, interesting item about some “grammar students” I met one day on the bus. Judging by the garb of the grammar students in this item, one issue was gang affiliation but the guys in this entry were clearly trash talking AND they desisted when the driver asked them to so….
http://rantwoman.blogspot.com/2011/08/grammar-lesson-conjunctions.html


Some more Quaker-themed reflections. To be VERY clear, I am VERY grateful about many things to do with the bus, the fact that the Seattle area has what in MANY respects is a really good bus system, always with room to grow, the fact that I have the stamina and capacity to use the bus easily, the color and connections of my bus experiences. Well, read on.
Whole new windows on matters of faith:

Warning: this item includes a verbatim comment from a drunk and contains the F word.
http://rantwomanrsof.blogspot.com/2009/11/im-very-religious.html


http://rantwomanrsof.blogspot.com/2010/04/time-to-pray.html


http://rantwomanrsof.blogspot.com/2010/08/bus-eldering-123.html


And finally, one about a VERY cool thing I learned about at a recent meeting, Project Safe Place. Project Safe Place is a way for kids in difficulty to tell the bus driver they need a safe place. The blog entry has a link about it. I think LOTS of Quakers who ride the bus might like to know about it whether or not anyone might necessarily feel called to intervene about things one might hear on the bus. I personally am glad to know people talking about it at public meetings are aware of the trafficking issue even though I want to make NO assumptions about how often that specifically is an issue.
http://rantwoman.blogspot.com/2011/10/project-safeplace-right-meeting.html


In the Light

(RantWoman)