star trek to planet k'tan

I have to say that I've long felt that disability offers something similar to Star Trek: it's an opportunity to figure out a better way to do something. When the original Star Trek came out, computers were around the size of a full room. Inventors and engineers took a look at that show and thought, 'hmm.... maybe we can make them smaller...?' - it inspired them to strive to create something that was previously unheard of.

Disability is the same way. Someone is in a chair and can't stand? Well, how about crafting a chair that can rise? Lost your limbs? Well, let's make cool prosthetics! Want to run? Let's tweak that fake leg! Can't talk, "locked in" (when you can't move any part of your body except for your eyes)? Let's make a speaking board that will activate when you attach a laser to your forehead and program it!

I see this stuff all the time, every day. I love that disability can stimulate people. I love that we have a choice as to whether or not we accept those inventions, utilize them. Me, I get sick of my hearing aids and sick of not being able to hear sometimes but in all honesty, I doubt that I'd do something that make me magically able to hear. I like being able to turn things off, I like my silent world. I like sitting in a busy place sometimes and only being able to hear a soft hum of the commotion around, like a blurred painting, colours running together.

I like that choice.

And so many things that were originally invented because of a disability become standard and help everyone. Take the phone: invented to try and communicate with the deaf. Typewriters: the guy who crafted that up just wanted to write to his blind lover. And curb ramps, oh curb ramps! - for wheelchair users but now much beloved by stroller-toting mommies, bikes and little kids with their radio flyers.

I just found out about a new one: baby k'tan carriers. I asked Mommies on The Board which baby carrier they'd recommend, and most responses pointed to the baby k'tan. Which was kind of funny because I'd already heard of it (besides the fact that I live in Stroller City, it was a hit on my 'regular' mommy boards), but I had no clue that it was invented by two parents specifically for their little babies with special needs: a mommy who has a son with Ds and a daddy with a son with a heart problem.

I can't wait to try it.