Essay on Disability and TXF
In case any one wants to hear me rant about my experiences as a disabled person in conjunction with a really mediocre X-Files episode, I wrote a meta at trustno1_redux called "Normalcy vs Capacity" about "The Walk." You remember it as the one with the astral-projecting quadruple amputee. Or you don't remember it at all, more likely. It does contain some lovely subtle acting by Gillian Anderson, though, who gets the nuances of Scully being a military brat (and therefore highly interested in justice within the ranks) very, very right.
Anyway, my meta opens with this vignette:
When I was sixteen, I had this dream. I was driving my dad's car, a beat-up early-nineties Jetta, stick shift. I was driving down one of the hilliest roads in our town, which lead past where one of my best friends lived. I was terrified that I would be out of control, but somehow I managed to drive that car successfully around hairpin turns and down seventy-degree drops. For most sixteen year olds, a dream of driving would be unsurprising, but I was not most sixteen year olds. For one thing, I hadn't even started learning how to drive, and didn't really care. (In fact, at twenty-seven, I still can't drive.) Oh, and I'd just had major surgery on both of my legs, was one week home from a two-week hospitalization, slept and ate and spent my days in a hospital bed in the living room, could barely transfer to a wheelchair, and wouldn't be able to walk unassisted for another four years.
I asked a friend who knew about dream interpretation what she thought the dream meant. "Dreams of cars usually represent control," she said. "Most of the time people dream of not being able to drive the car, though."
The friend, if you were wondering, was lysistrata.
Anyway, tt's full of exciting!crippled!Emily!stories, including Tales of Places Emily And Katie Would Make Out In High School, and you probably don't need to have seen the episode to have it make sense.
Oh, also, it's Christmas. I suppose I'll post on that subject tomorrow.
Anyway, my meta opens with this vignette:
When I was sixteen, I had this dream. I was driving my dad's car, a beat-up early-nineties Jetta, stick shift. I was driving down one of the hilliest roads in our town, which lead past where one of my best friends lived. I was terrified that I would be out of control, but somehow I managed to drive that car successfully around hairpin turns and down seventy-degree drops. For most sixteen year olds, a dream of driving would be unsurprising, but I was not most sixteen year olds. For one thing, I hadn't even started learning how to drive, and didn't really care. (In fact, at twenty-seven, I still can't drive.) Oh, and I'd just had major surgery on both of my legs, was one week home from a two-week hospitalization, slept and ate and spent my days in a hospital bed in the living room, could barely transfer to a wheelchair, and wouldn't be able to walk unassisted for another four years.
I asked a friend who knew about dream interpretation what she thought the dream meant. "Dreams of cars usually represent control," she said. "Most of the time people dream of not being able to drive the car, though."
The friend, if you were wondering, was lysistrata.
Anyway, tt's full of exciting!crippled!Emily!stories, including Tales of Places Emily And Katie Would Make Out In High School, and you probably don't need to have seen the episode to have it make sense.
Oh, also, it's Christmas. I suppose I'll post on that subject tomorrow.