Norm Meyer, who was the original owner of Midway Entertainment, a traveling amusement park business, wanted to do something for the community. He created a day specifically for individuals with disabilities to enjoy his amusements rides. Organized by the Orland Park Lions Club, one day each year, the Orland Days Carnival is open for special needs individuals and their chaperones. Imagine over 1,000 people of all ages with disabilities converging on a carnival. Sounds like fun, right.
The 1st year Mitchell's early childhood class attended (3yrs ago) I was overwhelmed and saddened. I had never seen so many people with so my challenges in my life. I avoided eye contact with most and tried to minimize Mitchell's obstacles in my head, I think to convince myself he was not like these other people. How could he be? He was my little boy and perfect and certainly he wasn't going to grow up and be as limited as what I am seeng here. As with most of my encounters with disabled adults, I went to my car & cried at the end of the day.
Boy how things change! Today I took on the carnival like we had been going our whole lives. I was excited to be in a place where Mitchell and all his quirks were accepted and basically ignored because everyone else had their own stuff going on. Everyone smiling at us and making me happy that there are so many people around in the same situation we are in. All the volunteers were super friendly and looked happy to be there as well. I am in awe at all the generous hearts willing to give their time to make someone else's day better. It was so comforting, not scary or depressing like it was 3yrs ago.
The first time I met my 2 great friends Ingrid and Nicole was that first trip to the carnival and today we chatted and walked around as if we were there with our other typical children -well no not really-but we did have conversations about things other than our kids. We were able to talk to the teachers outside of school and also ran into chaperones from Tri-County SRA and they let us know how excited they are summer camp will be starting soon and they can see the boys again. There's this whole new family we belong to in this world that was so foreign to us such a short time ago.
Unfortunately, Mitchell decided he wasn't riding any of the rides he usually loves. After jamming out in the food tent with extremely loud DJ and well balanced meal of bacon, chips and cheez-its, I had a dad set to take him on the tilt-a-whirl a zillion times but he dropped to the ground in disgust. We managed to get him on the Dizzy Dragon with his speech path, the stationary motorcycles and the bumper cars -he even said bumper a few times while in line- and that was it. I think it was a combo of he cold, rain and the tall attractions you climb being closed that helped him decide relatively early it was time to go home.
It was a great way to end the school year and see how far we have all come. Thank you Norm Meyer (and Orland Park) for making our day special!
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