Here’s a shout out to all the ADAPTers in Washington, D.C., this week marching in the chilly rain and taking on our nation’s powers-that-be.

If you want to know what ADAPT is demanding, follow the action here. It’s good stuff, and, as I’ve said before, as ADAPT goes, so, eventually, does the rest of our community.

I’m obsessed with ADAPT. It is a social phenomenon, much bigger than the issues it activates for, and it is — I believe — constantly reshaping who we people with disabilities are understood to be in our society. But that’s another entry for another day.

This entry focuses solely on what makes an activist do what the average ADAPTer does. Things may have changed in the past 10 years or so, but since at one time I would have sold a kidney to make it to the next National ADAPT action, I think I know a little bit about that mindset. I’ll structure this around key words.

Commitment. Focus. Anger. Community. Love. Hope. Trust. Belief.

That’s right, I said love, hope, trust and belief. That ADAPT activist with the angry scowl on his face, hair dripping from the rain, garbage bag taped around his power chair’s battery, eyes droopy from exhaustion, blocking that driveway or door or elevator or stairwell — Nobody in, nobody out! — is there because he loves his community. He is risking his body and his freedom because he hopes all people with disabilities will be free to live where and how they want to live. He flops out of his wheelchair and lays down in the middle of a highway because he hopes his actions will make a difference. He yells and screams in the polished mahogany lobbies of the highest offices because he trusts — Trusts! — that this nation constantly moves toward freedom and integration as it has, eventually, always done in the past.

His belief in his community, his actions and the ability of his people, which is all people, is what ultimately makes him successful. Is he angry? Oh, sure. Is he focused? You bet. Is he committed? Possibly in more ways than one. But don’t let him fool you. He is lovely, and hopeful. And I believe in him.

Good luck, ADAPT. Kick some bureaucrat ass!

You nailed it Josie!

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