It was Wednesday and I knew that I had to be at the state Capitol before 9:00 am.  At about that time, I was supposed to give a half hour presentation to the House Human Services Committee about my organization, Disability Rights Oregon.  I also had the task of bringing three boxes of materials to place on a table in the Capitol Galleria where folks could look at them. These were booklets about special education law, guardianship law, rules governing seclusion and restraint of school children and a stack of our brochures.  It was, you see, an event entitled: Developmental Disabilities Celebration - A Decade of Accomplishments.

I got to Salem with plenty of time to spare.  But rather than unpack the boxes, I decided to head into the Capitol to do some last minute preparation.  I sat at the back of the hearing room while State Epidemiologist Mel Kohn gave a PowerPoint presentation about the state's smoking cessation program.  While sitting there, I decided to talk about the ambitious goal of disability rights to reconfigure the world so that everyone can participate in it.  I chose three phrases as vehicles for this idea:  1.  "Nothing about me without me."  2.  "Want, get, keep."  and 3.  "Opportunity, Access and Choice."  The half hour flew by.

Then, I needed to get back to the car, take out the dolly, and wheel the three boxes of materials into the Capitol.  As I did this, I reflected on this aspect of my employment: moving boxes while dressed in a business suit to deliver information to a crowd of developmentally disabled individuals in a state capitol.  I don't recall seeing that in the job announcement back in 1986.

While I was setting out the booklets, a guy who advocates at the legislature for seniors and people with traumatic brain injury asked if I would meet with him to chat.  I agreed because someone was able to watch my table and the speeches and awards that always accompany events like this would not happen until noon.  So I went down to the lunch room to talk to Bill.

We started with small talk and were just about to launch into the topic at hand when over to our table comes Ralph, a union lobbyist.  Ralph is a very outgoing guy with one of those short social distances.  He put his face about six inches from mine and said: "Did you know Bill was an All-American college baseball player?"  The next twenty minutes were given over to teasing out of a very modest Bill that he was indeed an All-American in 1957 at USC, hitting over .360 for his senior year and playing with and for some of the greats of the college game.  Ralph said: "I love this.  You can take all this lobbying stuff and chuck it.  I just love this stuff."  Turns out Ralph had a brother who was a pretty good ball player in his day.  Modest, too.  Just like Bill.

Bill and I finally got down to our conversation about various disability groups working together toward common goals, and then I went off to the noon event.  The big accomplishments noted in the title of this event were that Fairview Training Center has been closed for 10 years and Oregon is now the only state that does not have a developmental disability facility or send its citizen to out-of-state facilities.  James Toews and Marylee Fay from the Department of Human Services were among those honored.  All awards are richly deserved.  A former resident of Fairview spoke as did a state legislator and the head of DHS, Bruce Goldberg.

This event happened in a basement hearing room at the Capitol. There are no windows.  Lighting is all florescent.  For this event, there were not enough chairs and so some folks sat on tables or stood.  There were no refreshments.  The majority of attendees were individuals with developmental disabilities, family members and providers.  The things we celebrated have made a profound difference in the lives of people who have suffered great hardships.  Many people have contributed to these achievements and many of them have demonstrated remarkable skill, patience and dedication to the task.

As I stood and watched, I thought back to Bill and his achievements on the baseball field.  I thought about his modesty.  I thought about the people in a basement room who have brought so much heart, brain and energy to their modest but compelling task. To quote Ralph: I just love this stuff.