Wow. I didn’t know what to expect this morning at AFI, especially at 9:00 am, but it was a morning well spent. I was a little worried about going on this field trip because I didn’t know what we were doing. At first, when I found out that we were going to be taking a tour, I kind if felt bad. I felt as though it would be like we were treating it like they were parts of a museum. Luckily, and I am glad, that wasn’t the case. The people at AFI seemed like they enjoyed us being there and they were used to having people come to the facility. I thought that this trip was really eye opening. I didn’t know places like this existed to give jobs, educate, and train mentally disabled adults. Actually being there and witnessing what goes on on a daily basis for the adults here made me sad in a way. It was just really strange to see older people not be able to function and live life as other people their age without a disability.
I wish that there was more I could do to help with these problems. I myself, do not really know how to interact with people with disabilities. I guess it goes along with the fact that I cannot interact well with children either. To be honest, when people were talking to me I was nervous. I just haven’t been exposed to situations like this very often, and I hate that I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to be rude, but I don’t know how to interact with them mostly because I don’t know their personal mental capacity and what they know and don’t know, or what they like and don’t like. I think that it is great that certain people are called to reach out to people with mental disabilities. I also think that it is great that AFI and other organizations get the funding they need in order to meet these needs. This was a wonderful experience!
As a little side note, I want to talk about someone I personally know with a mental disability. It is not too severe; he is about my age but is mentally 2 or so years younger than his physical age. He can function out in the world too, he is going to school for mechanic work and he does a good job fixing up cars. He is also the chic-fil-a cow, he likes the kids but mostly he likes scaring them because of the big cow suit. Going along with the story, I find it okay to laugh sometimes, not at them, but just laugh because of who they are just like we do with our friends. Most of this laughter I find is because they (or at least Eric) does what we all wish we could do and want to do sometimes, but he is allowed to get away with it. Like when he gets bored or fed up at work at our church, he takes one of the boats out in the water behind the church and with a megaphone tells his “boss” that he’ll be out there if she needs him, but he’s not coming back, and takes a nap. I don’t look at him like he has a problem; I look at him like he is like the rest of us, just a hundred times funnier than we’ll ever be.
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