Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist

by Judith Heumann

They accepted it and moved forward. That was who they were. That was their way.

I simply refused to accept what I was told about who I could be. And I was willing to make a fuss about it.

Even when we jumped rope or roller-skated, we figured it out. We’d put roller skates over my shoes and I would pretend to be skating in my chair, or I’d turn the rope for the jumpers, or play in some other way. I didn’t know anything different. Now I know that this was the way it was because we were kids, and kids are problem solvers. But it taught me, at a very early age, that most things are possible when you assume problems can be solved.

The world thought I was sick. Sick people stayed home in bed. They didn’t go out to play, or go to school. They weren’t expected to go outside, to be a part of things, to be a part of the world. I wasn’t expected to be a part of the world.

Part of the problem is that we tend to think that equality is about treating everyone the same, when it’s not. It’s about fairness. It’s about equity of access.

I will tell you why: democracy is slow. The work of a democratic government is supposed to be long and slow and hard. It must be that way.