From the Seattle Times:

Wil Kerner (left) builds elaborate and expressive artwork using construction paper and scissors.

What the autistic 12-year-old can’t express verbally or in social interaction he can show through his carefully cut out geometric shapes assembled into characters in a paper collage, a talent the staff at Seattle’s Harborview Medical Center calls a rare artistic gift. Large red circles become heads, delicate strips of fringed white paper become hair, and finely cut arches are shaped into eyebrows.

The art — and the artist — intrigues those who study autism. Dr. Stephen Dager, interim director of the University of Washington’s Autism Center, who has been studying brain anatomy and chemistry in autism, is mystified by Wil’s artistic talents. Autistic people generally pay little attention to eyes during social interaction, studies show, and usually are unaware of others’ emotions. Yet, Wil has the ability to mimic human emotion through his art.

Founder of furniture firm has dyslexia

From Fortune Small Business on CNN, a piece by Terri Bowersock. Her Arizona-based company, Terri’s Consign & Design Furnishings, is the largest U.S. resale furniture retailer, with 16 stores and $36 million in annual sales.

Bowersock says she is upfront about her dyslexia and runs her business on her own terms. She does presentations by drawing illustrations in crayon and pencil, and communicates with employees verbally rather than by email.

I also carry a tape recorder with me always. Writing notes takes me too long, so often I’ll just have people speak into the recorder, or I’ll speak into it myself so that I can check my “notes” later. Recorders are also built into my phone.

… People ask if I attribute my success to overcoming dyslexia. I tell them that I haven’t, and never will, overcome dyslexia. Yes, I run a national company, but I’m still using a Franklin Talking Dictionary to try to spell fifth-grade vocabulary words.

At least I’ve shown my grade school teachers that it’s not that I wasn’t trying hard enough.

Kirk Adams, writing in the Seattle Times, says Gov. David Paterson’s success should draw attention to the fact that people in the blind community face an unemployment rate that is 65 percentage points higher than the national average.

The general public assumes that the biggest barrier to employment blind people face is their blindness. In actuality, the biggest barrier is assumptions employers make about what blind people can or cannot do.

… Given the right resources, there will be many more David Patersons. One day, the conversation Americans will be having around the dinner table will not be whether a woman or an African American is qualified to be president, but if a blind person is capable of holding the highest office in this land.

And the answer, just like the answer to our present day’s question, will be a resounding yes.

Kirk Adams is president of Seattle Lighthouse for the Blind.

‘For Rachel Barton Pine, out to resurrect her career, time has stood still since her tragic accident. Unfortunately, the world has not’

From the Chicago Tribune, a major profile of Rachel Barton Pine. The violin prodigy became news around the world in 1995 when the strap of her violin case got caught in the door of a commuter train in Winnetka and she was dragged 300 feet along the track. The accident severed one leg and shattered the other.

Pine underwent many surgeries that broke her momentum and stalled her concert career. Then, when she was ready to return to performing, presenters shied away from booking her because concert halls could not accommodate people in wheelchairs or on crutches. A legal settlement pays her medical bills and Pine, now off crutches, is performing regularly, “one of the most accomplished violinists of her generation.”

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Jemma Leech wrote her way past 1,600 other children to win essay contest

From the Houston Chronicle:

”I am Jemma and I am immortal!”

Thus begins the one-page autobiography of Houston fifth-grader Jemma Leech who, though cerebral palsy has left her little control of her body, lives in a vivid world of images and words that modern technology now is beginning to let her share.

… In darker moments, Jemma writes about how others perceive her.

” ‘How can you,’ they say in hushed tones, ‘read, write and think like normal people do?’ ” she writes. ” ‘Surely that mother of yours is just making it up and should stop telling fibs.’ Well, d’you know? I do have a brain and I do have a mind — and the imagination of Dahl, the poetry of Keats, the drama of Shakespeare, the music of Verdi and the passion of them all in one.”

Her autobiography is here.

Here’s an earlier story on Jemma from the [UK] Times — Young, gifted and helpless: She is trapped in a body that doesn’t work. So how do you unlock her mind?

‘How I faced up to a deep-seated prejudice against disabled people’

[UK] Guardian columnist Stewart Dakers explores the complicated emotions he experiences when two acquaintances who have disabilities get married, buy a house and have a child. He describes Dave and Sue as having epilepsy and other conditions he doesn’t understand. “… A generation ago, they’d have been called ‘retards’.”

Dakers says he and other neighbors felt uneasy when the couple married, thinking it “improper, unseemly,” and “a step too far.” Their disapproval grew when Dave and Sue had a child. “No good can come of it … shouldn’t be allowed,” some said.

At this point, Dakers writes, he began to dislike Sue — and he sees that dislike as a positive development.

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Doctors advised Austin Underwood’s parents to expect nothing from their baby. Twenty-nine years later, he has proven them wrong. He’s been to college, lives independently and, best of all, wakes up happy every day.

By Mary Rogers in the [Fort Worth, Texas] Star-Telegram:

Twenty-nine-year-old Austin Underwood, who has Down syndrome, has beaten the odds to carve out a life for himself in Fort Worth, Texas. A doctor told his parents to “put him away,” but their dream for him was the same as for his siblings. They wanted all their babies to become caring, mature and independent adults. An excerpt:

He pays his way in the world with money he earns as a supermarket bagger combined with a disability check. His parents have made financial arrangements for his future, but his mother says she hasn’t given him money in years.

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