My people

This is the travel post I never completed in time for the last Disability Carnival over at Planet of the Blind. Lots of great posts over there.

The summer of 1998 I attended the Society for Disability Studies conference in Oakland, California. It was my first and only time traveling by air without any non-paid assistance from start to finish -- that is, I lugged my own suitcase out to the scooter-accessible van that took me to the airport and lugged it back into my apartment three days later without relying on friends to get me to and from the airport as I had usually done before.

That may not be a big deal for most people, but I was entrusting my scooter -- my only means of personal movement -- to the ordeal of airplane travel, and gambling on it being there for me in an unfamiliar city I was spending the weekend in. Alone.

If anything was broken in transit, I had absolutely no backup plan, and given the regularity with which wheelchair users' power chairs are damaged by the airlines I was taking quite a risk. I'd decided the risk was better than staying home. Additionally, I was counting on a scheduled accessible van to meet me at the airport, and for everything to be in order at the hotel.

This isn't the long story of mishaps you might expect it to be.

I arrived early in Oakland and the van driver found me easily. As he loaded my bag and, well, me into the van, he chatted about how busy he had been in the past few days. He was aware that I was visiting for some sort of disability event. He said, "I've been driving your people around all week."

My people. Disabled folks.

It was an excellent welcome to town.

Carnival reminders

In case you missed it, the Fifth Disability Carnival is out over at Planet of the Blind. The topic is disability and travel, and the variety of stories about get-around adventures is fantastic.

The next disability carnival will be at The Life and Times of Emma on Thurs., January 11, with the submission deadline presumably Monday, Jan. 8. The theme for Emma's rendition of the carnival is disability and relationships.

If you really want to plan ahead, the Seventh Disability Carnival is expected to be hosted by Museum Freak at Take Me to the Source of Chaos, and if I recall correctly, she's hinted somewhere (can't remember where I read this) that her chosen theme might be disability and technology. MF, correct me if i am wrong. The deadline for this should be Mon., January 22, if my calendar has it right.

The next Carnival of Feminists is coming out this Wednesday, Dec. 20 at The Imponderbilia of Actual Life. There's still time to get submissions in by tomorrow (Tuesday) on the topics of feminism and parenting or women in history.

The most recent Change of Shift -- a nursing carnival -- is up at Protect the Airway. My recent post "Last Year" is over there with other interesting stuff. Some of it's very medical, and from a medical professional point of view, but there are posts from the patient/client point of view as well.

Saturday Slumgullion #20

Three Guardian articles from the last two weeks -- 1) Identity crisis: Is the disability movement headed in the wrong direction? 2) Disabling the past: A look at the Middle Ages 3) The closed ward: The illogical world inside a psychiatric ward

The New York Times article, "Wanting babies like themselves, some parents choose genetic defects," looks at preimplantation genetic diagnoses that is used to favor embryos with specific disabilities. While the article itself isn't exactly even-handed or disability-positive, the comments following it are simply hostile toward disability -- genetic defectives, in the article.

New York's North Country Public Radio has a "People First" Readers and Writers on the Air series, a more literary continuation of their award-winning "Disability Matters" series from last year that included interviews and documentaries about the lives of disabled folk. Check out the audio archives with Stephen Kuusisto and Reynolds Price. Upcoming programs feature Nancy Mairs, Temple Grandin and Michael Berube.

The Hamilton Spectator article "Poisoned Lives" reports on the radioactive land Navajo's on a Utah reservation call home:

In every corner of the reservation, sandy mill tailings and chunks of ore, squared off nicely by blasting, were left unattended at old mines and mills, free for the taking. They were fashioned into bread ovens, cisterns, foundations, fireplaces, floors and walls.

Navajo families occupied radioactive dwellings for decades, unaware of the risks.

Over the years, federal and tribal officials stumbled across at least 70 such homes, records show. The total number is unknown because authorities made no serious effort to learn the full extent of the problem or to warn all those potentially affected.

The November issue of Perspectives Online, the online journal for the American Historical Association, includes a forum on disability history.

Stuart Hughes, BBC producer and blogger at Beyond Northern Iraq, who lost a leg while covering the war in Iraq is the subject of the BBC News article "Bionic man."

Autism Diva on the recent Newsweek cover story on autism.

Carnival round-up:

Deadline for the next Disability Carnival is Monday, December 11. The carnival will be up at Planet of the Blind on Thursday, December 14.

The latest Carnival of Feminists is up at Diary of a Freak Magnet.

Grand Rounds

Change of Shift

Visit the Disability Carnival #4

The newest installment of the Disability Carnival is up over at Diary of a Goldfish. Great reading for the long holiday weekend there, so check it out.

And get ready for carnival #5 at Stephen & Connie Kuusisto's Planet of the Blind on Thursday, December 14. The deadline, I expect, is the Monday before -- December 11. The theme is "Traveling with a disability: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly." See you there!