Those Little Life Moments

I'm a firm believer that every person has moments in their lives that shape who they are and what they value. For me one such moment happened when I was in the third grade. I had gotten a letter asking my parents to attend a meeting with other parents because I was selected to be in the Gifted and Talented program. At first my parents were overjoyed. We loaded ourselves into the car and made our way to the school library all the while with them telling me how proud they were of me for doing so well in school. But things changed once we got there. The program itself was wonderful but the parents... well lets just say I've never seen such a pretentious bunch in my life. One mom in particular was especially snooty. When the program's instructor opened up the floor for the parents to speak this one particular mom stood up and requested that the children in the program be separated from the children of average intelligence and under no circumstances were they to be around children with learning disabilities because and I quote "Our children are of a much higher caliber and we must not allow them to lower themselves by associating themselves with those kinds of people." To my (and my mother's horror) other parents started to agree with her. Now before we go further I think I should point out some pertinent information that might explain why what happened next happened:

• My father and sister have dyslexia one of those "learning disabilities" those parents didn't want their kids associated with. (Granted my "learning disabled" father has one hell of a career that pays very very well- so much so that I was lucky enough to have a mom that got to stay home with us kids.)
• My mom is of Native American and Irish decent. She doesn't handle discrimination well and that fiery Irish temper is a family trait that has not diminished over the generations.

Now with all the grace that my mother's Irish temper would allow she stood straight up and walked down to where those parents were sitting and relishing in how much "better" they were. Now my mom is a short thing with curly brown hair and glasses, not exactly the most intimidating person you'll ever meet but in that moment she seemed like she was 10 feet tall with fire billowing out her nose. And you could tell those other parents felt that too. I will never forget her looking at them and saying loudly:

      "Are you KIDDING me? We are talking about children! You're saying we shouldn't allow our kids to associate with others based on a test score!!!"
      "To be quite frank Mrs. Freund those children just are not good enough and we must surround our children with the right type of people from an early age."
You can imagine how well that comment was received by my mother.
      "Well to be quite frank Ms.(name that shall not be mentioned), I would allow my children to associate herself with 'those type' of people before I'd ever let her be around such a snobby, holier than thou, hypocritical, pathetic excuse for a human being like you! My child is no better than any other kid and I hate to break it to ya sister but neither is yours!" 

And with that she took my hand and led me out of that library slowly, with her head held high and fire in her eyes and some other parents followed suit. I can honestly say the program had a few less kids that year but I had never been so proud of my mom in my life and will remember that night till the day I die. 

I'm a person with a set of very important values. I'm pretty easy going and have a sort of live and let live vibe with the very important exception when it comes to a certain set of values I uphold myself to (then that feisty Irish temper makes it out of my DNA in a not so pretty way). One such value was learned that day my mom stood up to those women in the library. Do not discriminate. Never treat others as if they are less than yourself because the value of a human being is not measured on any test. It's not measured by their race, attractiveness, I.Q., sexuality, their income... the value of a person comes from inside. A valuable person is someone who leaves this world better than when they came in. A valuable person is someone who sees someone in need and has the ability to help them and does. A valuable person sees the value in others and brings it out in them so people can see them the way they do too. Every day I try to be a valuable person. Sometimes I fail at it but every day I try. 

I've been thinking about that night a lot as I've been writing my fourth book; Lessons Learned from Arnold St. James. It's my first YA novel (And it will be written under my maiden name so that kids won't read one of my romantic suspense novels and think it'll be like this one) but it's one of those books I feel just has to be written about overcoming the stereotypes of people with special needs. I feel like it is a topic that is not addressed enough. Prior to my work as a novelist I worked with adults with moderate to severe special needs, teaching them life skills and taking them out into the community. I will tell you something, I am a better person for knowing them than I ever was for knowing some of my "gifted" friends. You want to see strength? You want to see courage? You want to see determination? You get your butt to a Special Olympics competition.