New Year 2012

Happy Year to everyone who passes through my "thoughts"  Of course the new year comes with another plan to be more fastidious about posting more often! It seems as though I have many thoughts, opinions or observations that I want to write about the struggle always seems to be finding the time to sit down to post. There is always a conscientious effort to blog when it doesn't take away from Dakotas time however  I do loose some of my thoughts when I put them off --I guess just another sign of old age creeping up on me!

Last year was rather inert-- although I did manage to get Dakota Community Integration thru a Fair Hearing with IRC and an Administrative Hearing Judge. When the AB trailer 9 went into affect funding was cut drastically and community integration went down in flames for most clients-- however there are "exceptions" that allow the Regional Centers to fund this program but unfortunately it does not come easily.  So that was one of the highlights of the year. We were able to attend a few television tapings including American Idol and Americas Got Talent and then went thru the regular  events of the year -- only to top off the last week of the year but volunteering to help decorate the Rose Parade Floats.

One message I cannot repeat enough is the importance of getting your " Specially Challenged Individuals out in the typical community as much as humanly possible. I truly believe that although these kids need the safe haven of spending some of their time and days with kids that have challenges by the same token they absolutely need the typical Community experience ON A REGULAR BASIS. Not only is it good give them the exposure and ability to view and model from typical individuals BUT we need to expose the community to Autism and desensitize them from shunning or kids and disabilities in general. 

We have become such a judgemental society -- no matter what you see, most make a decision almost immediately what their opinion is of either a person or a situation. We need to educate people that it is not necessarily the first impression that dictates what is to be.   The ability to be compassionate , empathetic and accepting is slowly disappearing from our society-- We need to promote bringing it back. So many live with the opinion that they have to have what the next guy has, either clothes cars, homes, possessions, personality etc. If someone is walking down the Mall and they don't have the coolest clothes or phone or whatever the immediate reaction is they are a dork or don't deserve to be there--we need to stop it  and stop now-- The next time you find yourself drawing a conclusion --please just stop and think for a minute and put yourself in that persons place before you draw judgement--

This challenge is for our kids of course but it is for society in general it is a mantra we should embrace for the New Year and the all the years to follow. We can make this a better place and it starts with people opening their mind to possibilities.