Duty Lite

Every once in a while I am contacted by someone from the ‘community’, who does not know me and wants me to speak at an event of one kind or another. It’s that time again. I just got off the phone with Tim from one of the local private universities inn the city: used to be a good Presbyterian, wealth and wisdom college and now seems to have lost the religious component to just a school for the wealthy. Again, I am pretty easy I will just about speak anywhere especially if the event is work related and I can scam off some comp hours.

These speaking events are one of the perks of being a gimp as long as I have been. A person becomes an expert in their field just by default or being in the public focus long enough for the public to start believing their own judgment. I will be part of a panel made up of other folks with disabilities, one other I actually know, and one who is every ounce as strange as I. So doing a panel is doubly cool because I don’t have to do the whole show myself and I am usually skilled enough and have enough edge to have the other panel members generally support me in what I state. I have found out from the course instructor that this is a ‘general’ education class which means hundred of students and the class is set in one of the campus auditoriums.

So on this panel is a Rastafarian want to be, a former Para-Olympian, someone else and me. The Rasta want to be wears this great tam, he has honest to goodness blonde dreads can walk but uses a wheelchair for mobility. The Rasta has become a local disabled rights activist and is held in high regard by folks who don’t know any better, the jock is a para who found a way to play all the time and call it athletics and who knows what else. Perhaps the biggest difference in this job then other panels I have sat on is this panel is in a private institution. Tim actually indicated they were having an open house for the panelist before the class and would serve hot horde vies! Hot food…I hope they serve meat.

New Bio for Mark L. Smith

­Activist, actor, poet, writer, advocate, parent, and information specialist: Mark Smith. Mark smith has been on the Salt Lake scene since 1984. When Smith migrated to Salt Lake City from Blackfoot, Idaho when he had been employed as Disability Long Range Planner. In Salt Lake Smith was employed at the Utah independent Living Center where he toiled as their Community Resource Coordinator.

Mark became disabled in 1966 when he broke his neck and head in an auto motor cycle accident in his home town of Boise Idaho. Mark was 15 years of age at the time and the only thing which saved his life was the scene of his accident happened to be in front a fire station.

Mr. Smith currently works for the State of Utah as an Information Specialist, Utah’s only cross disability, cradle to grave, information and referral system. He is a home owner, husband, grandfather and aging baby boomer. His interests include, woodworking, cooking, reading, computing and searching the INTERNET. He and his wife, Dianne resides in U with their dog, Ginger. Mark’s favorite disability quote is Die bold’s, “Everyone has a right to risk”.