Here's a lovely article that makes one want to kick oneself at all the stupid jokes one is forced to suppress:
When I tell people that I love my work with my retarded clients, they
invariably conjure up a picture of a drooling monobrow with one arm
curled into his chest and a shit-eating grin on his face. This is a
stereotype of a retarded person. Here are some others: All retarded
people are happy-go-lucky; all retarded people pull their shorts up as
high as they can; all retarded people have bathroom accidents; all
retarded people want to hug you. In reality, retarded people are just
like you and me: They come in all shapes and sizes. They, too, put
their pants on one leg at a time. It's just that sometimes they put
theirs on backward.
There is, however, one stereotype about retarded people that is true,
one broad brushstroke that one can make about them all: Good gosh
a'mighty, retarded people love them some Huey Lewis. Part of the reason
is that Huey is apparently a sweetheart who does a lot of volunteer
work with people who have developmental disabilities. But another big
part is the music.
Like, when the author describes her experience taking one of her clients to a Huey Lewis concert and notes,
... my attention was immediately drawn to a middle-aged woman in the front
row who was crying hysterically. She was clutching a CD, wearing
mismatched, age-inappropriate clothes, and rocking back and forth.
"They won't let me go up to the stage!" she yelled. "I won't see Huey!"
She was telling this to anyone who would listen as if the people around
her had known her all her life. She was retarded. Among the several
hundred or so gathered for the concert, roughly 10 percent seemed to
have some sort of developmental disability. Huey really is a
phenomenon; it's not just with my clients.
I'm just dying to implicate M.A.W.B.ster St. Kate (a.k. Cathy in the Right) who recently enjoyed a Huey Lewis gig. But then I reach the end of the article:
I helped Bobbi up onto the chair and put my arm around her. We sang
along to "Doing It All for My Baby." The bitch-cake lady with the lip
gloss had stomped off. Before long, a woman with an American Idol
baseball hat and a speech impediment joined in on the song we were
singing, followed closely by her male friend with something like
Asperger syndrome.
Then it happened. Huey noticed us. He acknowledged our presence by strolling toward us and singing into Bobbi's camera lens.
"Huey!" she cried. "It's me!" He seemed to smile in recognition, then
did a backward shuffle step to the center of the stage again.
That's when it hit me. My clients all have one thing in common: They
want people to "see" them. Huey Lewis sees them. Huey Lewis has gone
out of his way to spend time with them. Huey would have given Bobbi a
chair if she needed one at a show, or he would have put her on his
shoulders so she could see. I just knew it.
Before long Bobbi's knees were really starting to ache from all the
standing, so we left during the encore. She never did get her DVD
signed, but she didn't seem to care. There would be other
opportunities.
"Oh, Huey," sighed Bobbi on the way home, "my Huey."
... and I give it up, feeling like a nasty, superficial, one-joke moron.
Oh yeah. You really should read the whole shebang. Especially you, .
