Here now is a truly, truly beautiful essay—titled “My wheelchair makes me invisible.”
It was written by Toronto’s Jennifer Wilding (who temporarily needs a wheelchair to get around), and originally published in the Globe and Mail and on theglobeandmail.com:
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From the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation comes this very very valuable nugget of information…
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Some tantalizing futurespeak, via Engadget:
“According to associate professor John Spletzer, the recipient of a five-year CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation, the goal is to ‘extend the autonomy of the wheelchair so it can navigate completely in an urban setting and take you wherever you need to go.’ This will be done by equipping robotic chairs with laser and camera sensors (which the team developed for the 2007 DARPA Grand Challenge) as well as exhaustive, Google Street View-esque maps of the city where they will be operating. Of course, these guys will be operating in a busy urban environment, so in addition to large-scale 3D maps, they must be equipped with motion planning features for operating in dense crowds and a changing environment.”
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We’re very, very intrigued by inclusive travel consultant Craig Grimes‘ Barcelona-based first installments of the YouTube video series “Lap Packing.” We truly hope he continues to make them!
Check out parts 1 and 2 of Lap Packing now:
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Then…
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Philip Patston’s been telling naughty naughty jokes again.
To see what we mean…click here.
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Meet other Ballsy Palsies
Meet other Wheelchairmen of the Board
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When Rob Buren broke his back mountain biking last October, he lost more than the use of his legs—he lost the physical confidence his 6-foot-2 frame had always given him.
And though the 38-year-old father of two quickly learned sporting activities such as hand cycling and sit skiing, it wasn’t until he took a new self-defence class for wheelchair-users that he began to feel at ease with his new paralyzed status.
“When you become a paraplegic and are in a chair, physically your world changes. You’re looking up all of a sudden,” he says. “(The class) was a great way for me to get to know my body again, to get comfortable in the chair and to build up a sense of confidence.”
The course, taught at Neuro Core Physiotherapy & Pilates Centre in Richmond Hill, [Ontario] was developed by Grant Murray, a taekwondo black belt, and Rich VanderWal, a recreation therapist at a rehab facility.
Each class begins with … Continue reading this article and watch a corresponding video on thestar.com
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Remember TiLite Wheelchairs, the awesome Kennewick, Washington-based company we profiled last month (”designed by engineers who use wheelchairs”)?
Well…we were thrilled to come across this November 4th message on TiLite’s official Twitter page:
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One in fifty Americans is now living with some form of paralysis.
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MAPLEWOOD, N.J. — “Circle six, parry four, parry, riposte,” Mickey Zeljkovic chanted, running Bianca Hollywood, 13, through her fencing moves.
Bianca has spina bifida and a pronounced S curve to her spine. But when she wears her mask and lamé, the underjacket that conducts electricity during fencing bouts, she can compete with fencers who can walk, as well as those who cannot.
“It’s a lot of fun, but it takes a lot of time to learn some of the moves,” she said after her session at the New Jersey Fencing Alliance.
The fencing club, in this suburban Essex County township, is developing what are believed to be the only wheelchair fencing classes for young people in the Northeast. Mr. Zeljkovic, who has coached Tariq al Qallaf, an adult world-champion wheelchair fencer, trains a handful of young people in the program, which began in May.
At the club’s headquarters, essentially a 17,500-square-foot room that holds 200 able-bodied competitors some weekends, the wheelchairs are secured to brackets that keep them from moving. Each bracket costs up to $8,000 and positions the duelers an appropriate distance from each other (determined by the fencer with the shorter reach).
The wheelchair-adapted sport traces its roots to veterans returning from World War II, and is only recently attracting followers among young people, with training programs in Atlanta, San Antonio and San Diego, among others. There are now only 27 wheelchair athletes in the United States Fencing Association, so the staff at the club believes there is ample opportunity for young people who start now to reach national-level competitions and even the Paralympic Games.
George Janto, president of the fencing club, hopes to have at least a dozen young fencers in training this year, and is looking for more participants, whose training and competition costs would be covered by the club and its fund-raising efforts. His first six fencers have conditions like spina bifida and cerebral palsy, as well as spinal cord injuries, and were … Continue reading this story on nytimes.com
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On IrkedMagazine.com, we’ve highlighted the extraordinary work of AXIS Dance Company multiple times over the past few years (hopefully driving a steady trickle of curious readers to their website).
But now, finally, AXIS has hit the mother lode…
