There's no pictures today. No music, quips or remarks. Just chillin' and thinking. It's a little late, but I wanted to work on today's entry so that everyone can digest it no matter what time of day that you read it.
I ran this video a few weeks back and it deeply affected me. I first heard about Amanda Baggs one evening while I was listening to CNN's Anderson Cooper, a person I admire. As CNN is almost always used as a background when I'm not listening to music, I only picked up bits and pieces. When I stopped what I was doing to listen more carefully, the piece was almost over. I jotted down two things that I heard. One was You Tube and the other was the young lady's name.
I didn't pursue it at first, but the little bits I could piece together kept gnawing at me until I realized that I had to find the video. It took me two days to find it and with my trusty dial-up computer, another lifetime to download it to my You Tube site.
After listening to it three times, it dawned on me that there was a depth to this person that no one knew about until she was able to "speak". My first thought was, what would have happened to her if she would not have been able to express her thoughts? Would "they" have put her in an institution?
This thought leads me to many more thoughts. How many people can't say what's on their mind? Imagine if you were speaking English to people everywhere and found that no one anywhere spoke English? Even worse, you could understand everything they said, both kind and unkind, about you and you couldn't reply, couldn't defend yourself, couldn't.....!
I could go on and on ! Watch and listen. Form your own thoughts. I would ask the readers of my journal, especially ones who have many contacts, to let their readers know about this particular lady and her video.
Please be aware that this video is eight minutes long. The first three minutes will be difficult to understand. Amanda will begin to explain it to you after that. The video is also closed captioned. Be patient.
If you ever wanted to leave a comment, but were shy or unsure, just imagine that you wanted to make a comment, but couldn't, and when you tried it read "zhaow,20f;w-f[qwkd" Today, my friends, is the day to make a comment.
That's it for today, my friends. More tomorrow.
Stay Tuned !
5 comments:
IMPRESSIVEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!! I am just amazed! Even though I work with a number of autistic kids and have for a number of years, I am blown away by this. It has really touched me, Jimmy! Thanks for sharing this with me. I'll have to pass this one on....
Jackie
Thank you for sharing this hon!! I was deeply touched by this for more than one reason. I'm not autistic but yes I do understand the rules of having to live and communicate under everyones elses expectations. I often wonder myself outside of this computer how many people would I truly communicate with, people tend to be rude and not at all forthcoming when they find out I'm deaf. Let alone if I had been autistic and considered non thinking as is Amanda. I'm learning sign language now, because quite frankly no matter how desperately I'm trying I'm losing some of my punciation skills. It's only been 2 years for me so this in itself is a struggle.........Not alot of people know the language of sign. I understand Amanda more than I can say.......I'll definately pass this on sometime in the near future. (Hugs) Thank you Again!! Indigo
Wow! I don't know what to say! That was really amazing and it touched me deeply. Thank you for posting this. More people need to see this.
Pam
As I told my brother when he put Amanda on, what a Blessing she is!! This should make anyone thank GOD for the blessings you have each day. She is truly amazing.
I think it's pretty incredible. I have never really encountered this before, and it really has me thinking tonight. Thanks for pointing this out.
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