We watched Peanut Butter Falcon on Netflix over Christmas vacation. The amusing, emotionally touching movie is a coming of age story starring a Down’s Syndrome young man (Played by Zack Gottsagen). Another young man with Down’s Syndrome is featured in Stumptown a television crime drama. Paralleling Falcon, Ansel Parisos (Played by Cole Sibus) is struggling with how to live as a young adult in Portland. Both of these shows are remarkable because individuals with Down’s Syndrome staring in major television roles would have seemed an impossibility thirty years ago.
I was young, feisty and full of energy. That comment made me furious. I thought if you want to see handicapped children than I will make sure we go out and identify them. The Developmental Disabilities Council provided a grant to the University of Wyoming to conduct screening clinics in Wyoming’s small rural communities that summer. The teams identified more than 650 preschool children who were in need of special education services. There is no voice more passionate or pervasive than a parent who is told their child needs services but the legislature is too miserly to fund the services. Believe me, the Chair of the Appropriations heard from those parents.
During this period, we were trying to fund early intervention preschools and adult work programs all across the state. We had a statewide funding formula which cost millions of dollars. Oil-rich Wyoming coffers could certainly afford to pay for these programs but conservative legislators were not convinced. We had the votes in the House because the Speaker of the House, a very conservative Republican was married to a special education teacher. He recognized the need. But we did not have the votes in the Senate.
I worked phone lines every day and every night. I wasn’t calling legislators. I was calling parents to call their Senator(s) and asked him to vote yes. The day of the vote the Senate gallery was packed with parents and children. The votes were tallied. The yes/no’s flashed up on the screen. We were one vote short. The bill was going to die. I could feel the disappointment of the parents squeezing my heart. One Senator from Newcastle, Wyoming, a tiny town in Northeast Wyoming stood up. You could hear a pin drop at that moment. He changed his vote to a yes. He said when he made the change, “I cannot go home and face my constituents if this bill dies. Wyoming needs to serve the developmentally disabled.” The gallery went wild. with applause and cheering.
Over thirty years later, handicapped children who had access to early intervention services are moving into our communities, working in our businesses, starring in television shows and movies. They’re showing us that advocacy work on the side of justice pays off.
The Women’s March is this weekend. I march in principle. Black, white, Hispanic, Native American, yellow, male, female, LGBTQ-A, handicapped, old, young; we all deserve an equal chance to succeed in this great country. We are a country where one person’s voice/vote can still make a difference.
I’ve been attending a Bible Study Class based on the movie, “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood”, starring Tom Hanks. The movie (based on a true story) focuses on the relationship between an angry, cynical reporter and his 1998 interview with Mr. Rogers. The reporter, Tom Junod, had a hard time when he first started interviewing Mr. Rogers believing that any human could be so kind. After following Mr. Rogers around the studio and meeting up with him in a variety of settings, Junod decided that Mr. Rogers was in fact the real deal. The interview eventually made the cover of Esquire Magazine. The title of the article was, “Can you say…Hero?” 
Use prayer to open your heart like an umbrella to help shield the world.
The six ton spud spent 2015 traveling to 29 cities covering over 22,000 miles. For folks into trivia, the giant potato is comparable to 32,346 medium potatoes, weighs 1,102 times more than the largest potato ever grown (11 pounds) and could be made into 1.5 million French Fries (pass the ketchup!) The national advertising for the commission features an Idaho farmer, who has lost the truck, asking people who see the giant roaming tater to send it home. According to the President of the Idaho Potato Commission, wherever the truck goes people shout, “Go Home!” (see clip below)
Her homesickness is assuaged when she meets an Italian American plumber, Anthony “Tony” Fiorello (Emory Cohen).
My Private Idaho 