Five-Star Disability

Hey everyone!

I don’t know about you, you, or you, and even you, whether you like to take sudden trips into towns, or places you grew up in.

As for me, I do like to go to two places I spent my youth.

I go in Port Coquitlam often, mostly the south area. My family live on Paula Place at the top of Mary Hill. We lived there from 1969ish until 1980. It was a fun place, I had many friends there. I also fell in love with riding my bike there, and lost a lot of blood! Because of accidents and scrapes and being thrown into a protruding corner of the basement. The babysitter was having fun, throwing my brother and myself around onto our classic beanbag chairs. Well, I slid right off the beanbag chair and smacked the wall! Huge gash, lots of blood, babysitter was so anxious, she refused to babysit again! My parents were called at the party they were at, dropped their Rum & Cokes, came home, picked me up, took me to ER, and I had a few stitches. Port Coquitlam was also the start of our big family trip to Disneyland in summer of 1976! Fun!

Phew, what a run-on sentence!

In 1980, my family moved to Maple Ridge, were we lived for 8 years, the longest 15 years of my life! In that span of time, I went to four different schools, was held back two years, and graduated when I was 20! There were other happenings in Maple Ridge that are not going to be published!

Anyways, the point of this blog is that I do enjoy walking in places that i spent a lot of time in my youth.

Right now I am sitting at a Tim Hortons (thanks for the WiFi) at the corner of 224th Street and Lougheed Highway. And I am going to tell you a story that happened at the intersection in the mid 80’s.

My family was going somewhere and we were turning left onto Lougheed Highway from 224th Street, when suddenly, my dad stopped the car in the middle of the intersection, got out of the car and vanished. I asked my Mum “what’s happening?” she replied, I believe, “There is a blind person in the middle of the intersection.” or something like that. About two minutes later my dad jumps back in the car and zooms off.

I did not see the blind man, but apparently my parents knew who he was. I wasn’t all that concerned. I was kinda, “blah, big deal” sorta thing a teenager would think about.

There are few things about this encounter that doesn’t meet the eye:

I was just being introduced to CNIB and blind culture, I was meeting blind kids, and I am pretty sure my Mum was silently saying, “I hope that does not happen to Craig!”

And, accessibility in the 1980s and 40 years later has IMPROVED! Curbs with ramps, and tactile warning strips, beeping crosswalk signals, now vibrating, automatic doors everywhere, ASL interpreters, Etc…

My only concern is that blind man, how the heck did he go from the curb to the middle of the intersection! It is obvious that he had zero useable vision! Perhaps he was “running away” for his overprotective, oppressive, home life? And he just darted into one of Maple Ridge’s busier intersections trying to get to the Dairy Queen on the other side? Who knows!

Do you know what this is called? There is a term of that behaviour… not the running away, but the walking across the intersection. Do you know it? Another example is if a person decides not to wear a seatbelt even through they save lives and are regulated by the law…

I’ll tell you in my next blog!

Thank you for reading this meandering blog!

Enjoy your day!