Points of interest

[An extraterrestrial robot and spaceship has just landed on earth. The robot steps out of the spaceship…]

“I come in peace,” it said, adding after a long moment of further grinding, “take me to your Lizard.”

Ford Prefect, of course, had an explanation for this, as he sat with Arthur and watched the nonstop frenetic news reports on television, none of which had anything to say other than to record that the thing had done this amount of damage which was valued at that amount of billions of pounds and had killed this totally other number of people, and then say it again, because the robot was doing nothing more than standing there, swaying very slightly, and emitting short incomprehensible error messages.

“It comes from a very ancient democracy, you see…”

“You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?”

photographedhistories:

”Nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people.”

“Odd.” said Arthur. “i thought you said it was a democracy.”

“I did” said Ford. “It is.”

”So” said Arthur, hoping he wasn’t sounding ridiculously obtuse, “why don’t the people get rid of the lizards?”

“It honestly doesn’t occur to them.” said Ford. “they’ve all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they’ve voted in more or less approximates to the government they want.”

“You mean they actually vote for the lizards?”

“Oh yes.” said Ford with a shrug, “Of course.”

“But,” said Arthur, going for the big one again “Why?”

“Because if they didn’t vote for a lizard,” said Ford, “the wrong lizard might get in. Got any gin?” 

“What?”

“I said,” said Ford, with an incerasing air of urgency creeping into his voice “Have you got any gin?”

‘I’ll look. tell me about the lizards.”

Ford shrugged again. “Some people say that the lizards are the best thing that ever happened to them.” he said. “They’re complteely wrong of course, completely and utterly wrong, but someones got to say it.”

“But that’s terrible,” said Arthur.

From So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish by Douglas Adams.

disabledtalk:

As someone with a disability, one of the things I often hear is assumptions about performance.  Usually it’s no one who knows me, or an overheard conversation, maybe it’s a scrap of overheard conversation or a side-note in a newspaper editorial.

What I hear is fundamental lack of understanding on the topic of coping.  I’ve heard it from doctors, I’ve heard it from therapists, I’ve heard it most of all from people simply conversing. 

When you’re doing - anything, no matter what it is - and you have a disability, there’s this tendency of assumption on the part of others that even if it comes back later, for now, your disability is gone.  Poof. Vanished.  Sure, while you’re lying in bed that afternoon due to stress and exhaustion you’re disabled, but three hours earlier, out grocery shopping, they see you and you’re fine so what gives?

Here’s what gives.  I can’t speak for all, but for most disabilities there’s a cost of coping.  There’s a cost of maintaining, of pushing back symptoms long enough to do sometimes even the most basic of things.  When you’re getting your groceries you aren’t just getting your groceries, you’re also managing your energy and stress levels, monitoring your body, and yes

coping

The unseen cost of coping is what most people without disabilities don’t understand.  That even when you appear to be asymptomatic, there’s a cost.  That the ability to cope doesn’t necessarily mean you’re any less disabled, not when that hour long grocery trip costs you hours, or days, in recovery.  So the next time you ask your disabled friend, or family member, or client, or patient, or student, why they can’t just do whatever it is you want them to do because you saw them at the grocery store the other day so they’re obviously capable of coping?

Please just remember that we pay for coping, just like we pay for not coping.  The cost may be hidden to you, but it’s not to us.

-anon submission

(bolding by mod)

(via flapjackstate)