The perils of different abilities

Once upon a time an uncle of mine had a change of bosses. When that happened my uncle told the new boss that he wouldn't understand what was being said unless the bosses face was towards him. The boss didn't quite get that. He always started facing my uncle, but would turn around and do something else. Then my uncle was fired for not following orders. And the problem is that my uncle doesn't have hearing over the normal spectrum. But the bigger problem is that the boss didn't make consideration for the needs of the employee and lost an age discrimination suit.

That will probably never happen in my case. But I had a customer last night who spelled his name for me. I said something along the lines, 'Could you give me a minute and let me get back to your name' and he spelled his name again. And I asked, 'please give me a minute before you give me the spelling' and I heard the letters again. It was a perfectly good name of german origin - and one of my grandparents is a german immigrant - and because he kept spelling the name for me I couldn't get the word in my head and without the word sound I couldn't find the word on the screen. My abilities inmusic mean that I see sounds and hear letters words in musical patterns. Each letter for me is also another sort of sound/movement. And when I don't have the word in my head - spelling it leaves the letters in a jumble.

Some of the people who don't have sight with their eyes tell me of people who grab their arm and say 'let me help you across the street' That arm grab is likely to startle the other so that they fall rather than to help them and they may be pausing to figure out what they're doing next rather than waiting to cross the street.

When we help - or try to help - we need to take into account what the other is actually asking for. Sometimes it's not what we think they want. And certainly there are times when our suggestion may be better than what they ask for. But if we don't pay attention to their request we are no better than a dictator. So for all those people out there that seem to need help. Helpers, please listen, ask, offer instead of immediately jumping in. The person who has different abilities will appreciate that offer a whole lot more than when you impose your idea of what they need upon them.