A life changer

OK so today I volunteered as an official to help out at the Special Olympics Bocce Ball. It was an interesting experience, though I'm not a particularly prejudice person, I’ve never had any of empathy for the mentally disabled people. I'm am very smart person; a deep thinker, I highly value intelligence. iv always looked down on those without much. however, after today’s experience I have gained something that will stay with me for the rest of my life. I now truly understand the value of a human life. I’ve always measured a persons worth by their intelligence or by how helpful they were. but in one day all that has changed, I feel lowly for thinking in such a way, and hope that I can make amends.

When I arrived at my school today to be an official at the Special Olympics Bocce Ball I expected to see a bunch of helpless, and yes, even worthless people who had to rely on us "privileged people" to do anything. But once the games started and I began to watch these people play I slowly began to realize the truth behind it all. I saw people young and old, gather together to play a simple game that brought them much joy. As I watched the teams play together I saw real teamwork and cooperation. and perhaps the most impacting thing I saw was how sportsman like they all were. Usually you go to a baseball game or something and you see either side cheering themselves on and jeering the opposing team, you see genuine aggression quite often. Today I saw opposing teams cheer the other on, and congratulate them on a good toss. The whole day I did not see any aggression towards the opposition. Most of the people playing didn’t even seem to care if they won or lost. I’ve never seen that before.

On my break I wondered around to watch the other teams play. I saw severely disabled people in wheelchairs giving everything they had to chuck the bocce ball down the court, and I wondered to myself, if I was like that, would I even give the effort. I thought to myself "what kind of character and/or determination does it take to do that." I spoke with many of the players, they were all so nice, and didn’t really care what you talked to them about, just so long as you gave them the attention. I saw this small girl come around hugging people at random ecstatically saying it was her birthday, she told me she had turned 19. I saw surprised such a small girl was 19 years old. But the thing that struck me was how open she was, I know if I was that excited about something, probably no one would know, and I certainly wouldn’t go around hugging people at random, thought I can really say I wouldn’t want too, I just wouldn’t, it would make me seem weird.

today has changed the way I think about people, and indeed, the whole way while I was driving home I though about how the "normal" people act in today’s society, and what I had seen today, and wondered who really were the disabled people; them or us.