We Are Here
October 27, 2006 by Kristina Chew, PhD
Filed under Autism Advocacy Conference, Disability Rights
Kassiane arrived just before 9.30pm at Newark Airport, where Jim and I had met another of the conference panelists, Professor Bruce Mills of Kalamazoo College; we had passed the time in talking about the various ways in which our boys script, Edgar Allen Poe and e.e. cummings, and service learning projects in which college students spend time with a family. After we met Kassiane in her bright orange jacket and with a card saying “I am autistic” carabinered to her bag, we drove towards New York City, choosing the route with (as Kassiane requested) the fewest lights. It was nearing onto 11.30pm.
Gloria Pearson-Vasey and her son, Kevin, and husband had already arrived, after driving here from Canada. We all have rooms on the same floor of the conference hotel: We are all here together.
Jim checked his voice mail and found that seven more people had called to register. “I know it’s late but I’m coming anyways,” one person said.
We are here.
Jeff Stimpson
Jill Cornfield
All the very best for an informative and enlightening conference. I wish I could be there (pesky ocean getting in the way!).
My thoughts are with you at the conference.
Have a wonderful and productive weekend!! Can’t wait to hear all about it.
“We are here” — in the Hebrew of the Torah, “hineinu”. If you search for it in the singular (”hineini”), you find from the contexts that the Hebrew connotes not just presence, but readiness.
And upon completion of the conference, as we say upon completion of the weekly cyclical public reading of a book of Torah, “hazaq hazaq ve-nit-hazeq” — let us continue to strengthen each other.
Phil: I was thinking of incorporating this into my speech……..Hineni was the name of the private autism school that Charlie started to attend last December (and that closed in June), and that helped him start learning and liking learning again.