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Date: | Fri, 6 Jun 1997 23:03:40 -0400 |
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Toby:
the story is "Welcome to Holland"
by emily pearl kingsley
I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a
disability... try to help people who have not shared that unique experience
to understand it. to imagine how it would feel, it' s like this...
When you're going to have a baby. it' s like planning a fabulous vacation
trip ..to Italy. You buy a bunch of quidebooks and make your wonderful plans.
The coliseum, the Michaelangelo David, the gondolas in Venise. You may learn
some handy phrases in Italian... all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your
bags and off you go. Several hours later the plane lands. The stewardess come
in and says "Welcome to Holland"
Holland ?!? you say. What do you mean Holland? I signed up for Italy. All
my life I've dreamed of going to Italy...
But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland, and
there you must stay.
The important thing is that they havn't taken you to a horrible, disgusting,
filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different
place
So you must go out and buy new guidebooks. And you must learn a whole new
language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would not have
met.
It' s just a differnt place. It's slower paced than Italy, less flashy
than Italty. But after you've been there a while and you catch your breath,
you look around, and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills. Holland
has tulips. Holland evan has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy and they're all
bragging about what a wonderfiul time they had there. And for the rest of
your life, you will say, "yes. that's where I was supposed to go. That's what
I had planned"
But if you spend the rest of your life mourning the fact that you didn't get
to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely
things about Holland.
Patricia
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