Genetically defective

TryHarder™ Magazine: Ableism Speaks

/ Ingrid Tischer / 3 Comments
TryHarder™ Magazine: The Magazine for People Who Need to Try Harder, 2 cents

Issue No. 1: Ableism Speaks 

In which The Crip gives very special ableist remarks the 2¢ they deserve

“If you’ve got your health, you’ve got everything.” 

2 cents symbolSure, health is important but if you’ve always lived with a chronic condition and/or a progressively degenerative one like I have, hearing this most common of platitudes leads to a waxy bummer build-up in the psyche. It is no pleasure to ponder the possibility that you regard me as having…nothing.  Nor do I want to reprise my role on Emotional Labor: Special Cripple Unit where I tell myself you don’t actually mean anything bad by that. I would prefer instead that people express gratitude for what health they have (I know health is a nice thing!) without making such a sweeping generalization about what a good quality of life requires.

Did You Know?

A disability does not necessarily mean “sick.” Unless you mean, “sick of discrimination.” Then — oh yeah.  #CripTips

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There’s No Cure for Gretchen Lowe: The Dignity Initiative

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Another Excerpt From There's No Cure for Gretchen Lowe a novelAnd she had made sure the door was locked. She stood there, watching the gray-blue paint and listening to what was happening from within. At first, nothing. Then a murmuring confusion, then a rapid rise in decibel levels, quickly becoming Frank’s singular baritone summoning Gretchen. It didn’t occur to anyone that it was anything but an accident.

She waited and then knocked to get their attention.
“Hi!” she called. She had to knock harder because, as usual, they were still talking. “Hi, everybody! Are you ready to start the meeting?”

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There’s No Cure for Gretchen Lowe: A Mother’s Day Card From Alice

/ Ingrid Tischer / 1 Comment

Another Excerpt from: There's No Cure for Gretchen Lowe, a novelAlice’s schoolteacher handwriting greeted Gretchen when she flipped through the mail that evening. It was a floridly pious Mother’s Day card with a letter enclosed. Her mother must have sent it right after Gretchen had called about the board meeting fiasco. Oh Alice, Gretchen snorted pleasurably. I couldn’t have picked a better card myself.

Underneath the card’s summary appreciation for maternal sacrifices, physical and emotional, Alice had written, “Thought you might like to see the enclosed item right now. I think it confirms that we are related. I cannot take credit for why you are who you are but I did have a hand in it. Then again, you were always a rotten child. Not that I had anything to do with that. Love, Mom.
The letter was her mother’s same handwriting.  Cheered, Gretchen set to reading it. It was dated from May 1970 and addressed to a Desmond Wallace, Chair of Fundraising Operations for the National Cerebral Palsy Association. Oh dear.

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My FEDup™Rant: I Want to Be Envied

/ Ingrid Tischer / 1 Comment
FED UP TM Ideas worth ranting aboutI’m FEDup with aiming way too low.
I realized this after Congress voted this week to deny me the pleasure of peeing like non-disabled people do, which is to say, without having to do any kind of math, scheduling, or general advance planning when going out to public places.
But by being denied the minimum, I’ve learned to want everything.
You know what would be great? If I could be envied by non-disabled people.
Yes – envy’s bad! I shouldn’t want to be envied. I should want inclusion. Justice. Equality. I should want respect, love, acceptance.
Of course I want all that. But I want more.
I want to be envied by non-disabled people. Not admired. Envied.
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