Life is for living
- 18 Jul 06, 11:57 AM
The New Zealand Office for Disability Issues has recently published Life is for Living, the collected stories of 25 New Zealanders who are either disabled themselves or who have disabled family members, and who are therefore described as "living with disability".
There are various methods of accessing the publication online, the easiest of which is the .
You can also download it as a
(in which case you don't get either the photographs or the index) or as a .
The whole thing is well worth a read. However, given that it's 125 pages long, Lady Bracknell has picked out two of her favourite characters from it for you as an indicator of the sort of stories it contains.
is a radio ham who discovered that the cable which ties his aerial to a steel tower in the garden had come loose. He started to climb up the tower to fix it but, because he's blind and was in his eighties at the time, his neighbours were concerned for his safety and persuaded him to come back down. So he waited until it was dark, and went back up and fixed it when they couldn't see him.
describes himself as a typical 18 year old, but his story consistently demonstrates a remarkably mature attitude. He says,
"I value my independence. It's not just a matter of having independence, it's a matter of having the want to be independent. I think a lot of people with disabilities, especially young ones, are wrapped in cotton wool by their parents, and not pushed to be as able as they could be. I'm not talking about being able to walk or put their own shoes and socks on, but catching the bus or going into town by themselves and meeting up with friends – doing the things that everyone else is doing. I have the attitude 'there’s no reason why I can't!'."
Comments
I know someone like Jack - he's not blind, but he has the same slightly mischievous attitude.