When I was in fifth grade, I ordered a wonderful book from Scholastic Books. Now when I was in school from 1966 to 1978 disabled kids were shunted off to special programs or schools or warehoused. My cerebral palsy is minor so I went to regular school, which wasgood and bad.
I got a good education in 2 areas, physically normal people are often assholes to people who are different and most importantly a good education that prepared me for college. My Dad always said "It's better to out run idiots mentally." But this brings me back to why this book was also a turning point for me.r
Not being around other disabled people made it difficult to judge the extent of my impairment and I missed out on seeing other disabled folks work a rounds to compensate for the parts of their bodies that worked differently. Reading about Charles Proteus Steinmetz helped me visualize a different disability and how another person handled it. I went from The Man Who Tamed Lightening to books on Helen Keller, Louis Braille, Clara Barton, Florence Nightingale (The Lady With The Lamp....I loved that one) and Follow My Leader... A book about a boy my age who lost his sight in an accident.
So, without Steinmetz I might have been a scared kid forever. I love science, biology especially, but excel in art. I will always use anatomy etc to design my dolls, so he helped make me a better artist and a stronger person.
He was probably the start of my ideas on relative beauty too. Within the parameters of being a hunchbacked little person with dwarfism and hip dysplasia, He's not a bad looking man.
As I work on each new doll in my Uniques series, I think fondly of Steinmetz. I'm working on a doll with interchangeable arms and one with microcephaly. I watched Freaks again recently and the 2 girls and Schlitzie motivated me.
What books or films have inspired you?
