Mikelle and I feel compelled to write about life with a disability, not just the challenges but the opportunities, the friendships, the innovations, and the brilliance of our communities in action as we share our everyday life living with a disability. With a little more information, motivation, we hope to share how our life is shining beautiful and maybe help you to shine beautiful, too.
Rethinking, Reimagining, and Resolved to be Resilient.
We at the Shining Beautiful Series are rethinking our entire way of providing support for Mikelle to define a new and vibrant rhythm to life in a world that changes daily. Over the years, we have engineered, refined, and established a remarkable way of supporting Mikelle, effectively maximizing her self-determination
Drive-Thru Inclusion in the Time of COVID.
Our community is in transition. Inclusion looks different than it did just months ago. It is mid-July, and it has been hot and dry here in Denver. For weeks now, the sun has kissed the thermometer sending it to near 100 degrees. Protests against police brutality and Black Lives Matter
Birthdays, Community and COVID
Typically, each year we celebrate Mikelle’s birthday at Cheeseman Park. We have been doing this for so long I actually can’t think of the last time we didn’t celebrate there. We celebrated her 29th birthday when the temperature roared by 105 degrees. We celebrated in down coats and gloves with
Change and ResponsAbilty
Change – the pace of change is real! None of us could have planned for COVID, protests, economic challenges, job loss, and alteration in services for our families. I know Mikelle, and I never thought we would be social distancing. Our focus has always been being active in our community.
The Purse Diva Acquires New Shopping Strategies During Lockdown
Mikelle’s inner fashionista is frustrated! One of Mikelle’s loves in life is Mikelle’s is purse shopping. Typically, just after coffee and before Gilmore Girls, Mikelle reaches for her iPad. Her long finger scrolls through the pages until she finds her Visual Scheduler app. As Mikelle lists the various activities she
Wait! What Happened to Our Community?
Creating Community in the Time of Social Distancing. Mikelle looks longing out our second-story window reminiscing about the days when her routine included a trip down the street to the neighborhood coffee shop. There she gets her people and caffeine fix. This is her well-loved routine. Pablos in the
Soul Mates. A Story of Love and Friendship
Fifteen years ago, a thoughtful high school teacher introduced Mikelle Learned and Jerome Stewart, she had a hunch these two might become the best of friends. She was right. Jerome played football, ran track and was a well-liked senior at East High School. He, like Mikelle, was a recent transfer
Happy New Year!
Happy New Year! As we begin this new year, I am aware of two things. One, I am getting older. Two, the world is changing faster and faster getting more complicated every day. My strategy is to learn to be young in thought and deed. Young people tend to be
Holiday Harmony
Many of you, who came of age in the 1970s like me, remember being inspired by a television commercial. It was a Coca Cola commercial, where a lighted candle appears on the screen, and we see a young, beautiful woman singing, “I’d Like the World to Sing in Perfect Harmony,”
Holiday Blessings
Bless our hearts. The heart, our capable and vigorous organ pumps our life force throughout our body. It pumps while we wake, slumber, worry, laugh, hug, quarrel, growl at traffic, touch a lover’s hand, sip hot coffee, savor a mint julep, or a tangy sassy margarita. As Christmas approaches, our
Feeling Out of Balance?
Whoa! Does the world appear to be a little off-balance these days or what? Let’s be real. Most of what we knew growing up no longer exists. Wishing we could go back to what appeared to be stable and predictable isn’t going to help you cope with a quickly changing
Jim Warne, Ogalala Lakota film producer meets Mikelle!
Recently, Mikelle and I had the honor of interviewing Jim Warne, film producer of the documentary, 7th Generation. I met Jim at the Washington Initiative on Supported Employment annual Community Summit last June. She attended is a powerful session on disability, the importance of community and tradition and learned more