Like, Totally 80′s Music Video Based Disability Perspective

The song “Take On Me” by the band A-Ha is one of greatest pop songs that came out of the 80’s, and it’s definitely in this guy’s top five fave songs of that decade. The song also had a fantastic music video that included what at the time demonstrated cutting edge animation technology. The basic plot is that a girl in a diner is flipping through a comic book story when the hunky featured character comes alive, gives her a wink, and extends his hand to her from inside the page of the story. When she takes his hand she suddenly finds herself pencil-drawn animated inside the comic strip with him and the 80’s style romantic-adventure hijinks ensue.

But by far the most iconic scene of the video (about 1:22 in), the one that included the most “cutting edge” of the cutting edge animation, included a sequence involving a mirror. When the hunky animated guy steps behind the mirror he is suddenly and magically no longer animated. As the camera revolves around the mirror on one side you see the animated guy looking though the mirror at the non-animated girl, then on the other side you see the animated girl looking through the mirror at the non-animated guy. Whether each person was animated or not, or saw the other as animated or not was a matter of perspective.

Watching that video now days I can’t help but think that it provides a perfectly analogous representation of my particular way of viewing the world. On the one side of the mirror, if you will, I view the world from the perspective of a person who has lived fourteen and a half years with a pretty significant disability (C-6/7 spinal cord injury quadriplegic), but by the same token on the other side of that mirror I still view the world with able-bodied eyes having spent the first seventeen and a half years of my life with a full arsenal of physical faculties. That kind of two-fold perspective is a quality that I’m sure most people living with SCI share (Other mobility disabilities that get acquired later in life as well for that matter).

But it’s an interesting dichotomy. What a lot of people don’t realize is that when you suddenly become paralyzed there’s no switch that gets flipped in your brain that shifts your outlook on the world from an able-bodied to a strictly disability perspective. Everywhere I go and everything I do every day I view things simultaneously from an able-bodied and disability viewpoint. For example, when I need to get onto or off of a sidewalk I not only immediately start searching for the nearest curb cutout but I’m also thinking about how much easier it would be to just take that simple step up like I used to be able to do. Related, there have been countless times that I’ve observed how cool certain houses look while seamlessly assessing that I couldn’t get in on account of the stairs. So it can be frustrating at times, but I wouldn’t have it any other way either.

“Everywhere I go and everything I do every day I view things simultaneously from an able-bodied and disability viewpoint. “

Being able to see through both sides of the “mirror” also provides me with a sharply unique insight when it comes to people and how they interact with me and other people with disabilities because I still remember what is was like as an able-bodied person to come across someone with a disability, notice their differences, not know what to say, and/or how to properly react. I think my first memory of someone with a significant disability was a lady with CP who attended my church: she used a wheelchair, she could hardly speak, and her mom had to push her around. It seemed like the only times she came to church were at Christmas and Easter, and they always sat in the same spot on the far side of the sanctuary by the stained glass windows. Flash forward to my post-SCI years and now I am the one in the wheelchair who hardly attends church other than the holidays and my family sits in that exact same spot on account of it being the most accessible and out of everyone’s way. And every time I go to church I am cognizant of the fact that on various levels I have provided that same early impression of a person with a disability to a new generation of people over the last decade.

So when I see some punk kid elbow his buddy point, laugh, or make a crack at my expense (e.g. I was once called Timmy, the kid with a disability who uses a wheelchair on the show “South Park”) it ranges between annoying and hurtful, depending on my mood, but I can still relate on some level as well because once upon a time I was a probably part of a group of kids that did something similar. Wrong? Yes of course, but kids are kids and sometimes they’re too young to know any better. Hopefully, later in life they realize it’s inappropriate behavior.

Obviously, this dual perception applies to interactions with adults as well. For example, I recently went out to dinner at a restaurant that ultimately had four people with wheelchairs sitting around the same table. At one point a few younger ladies sat down at a table next to us and my friend claimed that one of them gave him an “Oh great, I have to sit by the cripples” kind of look that unfortunately many people with disabilities get on occasion. One member of our group needed help eating his soup, and I soon noticed a middle-aged couple sitting nearby that kept whispering to each other and looking over at him while he was being fed, giving the strong impression that they were bothered by what they were observing. The most annoying thing on both accounts is that those kinds of people hardly seem to take into account that we know that they are looking at us and that their reactions can be hurtful. It’s in specific sets of circumstances like those that I can’t help but think that they would be more polite and respectful if they saw things with the dual perspective that I have.

“The most annoying thing on both accounts is that those kinds of people hardly seem to take into account that we know that they are looking at us and that their reactions can be hurtful.”

In fact, I’ve always felt strongly that if more people in the world viewed things from that particular two-way “mirror” disability/able-bodied perspective that there would be far less stares, negative disability stereotypes, instances of inaccessibility,  and disability discrimination out there because so many more people would “get it.” All that being said, considering my lot in life I think my unique perspective is a quality to be envied and I’m glad that I can utilize it on a daily basis. But as strangely connected to the classic “Take On Me” video that I feel in this regard, one thing about that song is still evident: I couldn’t hit that high note if my life depended on it.

Photo Credit: Some rights reserved by R Stanek

Do you have a unique perspective when it comes to disability? What are your experiences, whether you are a person with a disability, a caregiver or parent, medical professional, etc?