I’m guessing Cassandra is in her early forties. She has lost the freshness of youth, but is not yet in serious decline. No longer slim, she is not yet stout. Her brown hair is cut short in a way that says “professional, but still a woman. Find me attractive, but don’t trifle.”
And she has a boatload of initials behind her name, something that shows up in every memo, staff listing, or newsletter to parents and supporters. She has worked hard to earn those initials and you better not forget them, apparently bonded to her accomplishments like a tick to a dog’s ear. She is Executive Director for a reason—and you aren’t.
Cassandra made one thing very clear during that initial training session. Loose lips sink ships—and employment opportunities at New Directions.
“Our clients are to be referred to as such—as clients. Because that is what they are. They are the source of our revenue and the raison d’être of our business. We exist to serve them. They are our customers. To an extent, they tell us how to do our business. Not by speaking directly, but by their needs. Their needs are our command.
“One may also call them residents—a term reserved for those who actually live here on the campus. They reside here. This is their home, at least until we can get them out into ILAs—independent living arrangements.
“There is one thing they must not be called. They are not to be called retarded.”
You could tell that even saying this word was painful for her. She pursed her lips and wrinkled her nose.
“The use of that word was once commonplace and it is still officially used in parts of the scientific and medical community. Some of our parents even use the word. But that is no excuse for any staff person using it at New Directions. It is demeaning, insulting, and inappropriate. It will not be tolerated. A first documented use of the word will result in a one-week suspension without pay. A second use will result in your termination.”
The emphasis she put on the word “termination” made me a little uneasy, but I reminded myself it only meant “fired,” which I had experienced before and figured I could deal with again. (After all, Zillah fired me as a husband almost two years ago, though it isn’t yet official.) When Judy and I were kids, everybody used the word “retarded”—and thought it perfectly acceptable—but my parents and I had only called her Judy, and so I figured I could avoid the R word as well as anyone.
“If you must use a generic term to refer to a collective medical condition, you should use ‘developmentally disabled’—up to the age of twenty-one. Once they are of adult age, ‘developmental’ is more problematic because an adult is not usually considered to be developing. After twenty-one they can be called ‘cognitively disabled’ or ‘intellectually disabled,’ though these terms would not fit everyone of course. All of our clients are cognitively disabled; many also have physical disabilities. All of them also have adaptive or behavioral challenges. And no matter what their needs, they all have their full AAMR rights.”
“You can’t tell the players without a program,” the vendors used to yell at the ballpark. I’m starting to think I need one.
“Some people, of course, wish to use terms like ‘differently abled’ or a wide variety of ‘challenged’ constructions. These are acceptable, especially if their use is initiated by a parent or advocate. You may wish to listen to the terminology used by the person you are speaking with and to echo such terminology yourself in conversation with them, as long as the term is acceptable. But it is always appropriate to use the word client, and that is the word I wished used among ourselves as much as possible. Is that clear?”
I nodded vigorously. I learned long ago that the question “Is that clear?” is usually code for “Do this or else.” What’s clear is that language is a weapons depot of small arms and high explosives, just waiting for a careless spark.
Cassandra then explained the different programs that each resident participated in during the day—day activity centers, sheltered workshops, non-sheltered workshops, work on the New Directions campus, public employment, and the like.
So far I was keeping up okay. But when she got to the federal programs, state programs, local laws and bylaws, industry standards, volunteer organizations, professional organizations, and best practices mandates—all identified by title, letters, and numbers—I was as lost as a lamb in a blizzard. I think maybe she was glad about that. She saw the look on our faces and smiled.
“Don’t worry if all this seems like drinking from a fire hose. As with any business, there’s a lot to learn. But I am confident you will learn. And I and the rest of the staff are here to help you.”
She then turned the training session over to Mr. Springer, the facilities manager, and left the room, the sharp click of her heels fading as she moved down the hall.
Bo Springer, I have since decided, is an example of Hemingway’s great American man-child. Zillah would call him a bro. He’s in his early thirties, but has not developed emotionally, spiritually, or intellectually since he was seventeen. He went to college, but proved impervious to books, paintings, professors, or any idea that required him to reconfigure his existing understanding of reality. For the bro species that understanding centers on beer, sports, porn, and video games. If he was conscious enough to form a philosophy of life, it would be something like: “I hang out, therefore I am.”
How do I know this? I don’t. It’s simply the conclusion I came to about six minutes into his talk at this training session, the first time I’d ever laid eyes on him. And it’s only been reinforced since. Quite judgmental of me, I know, but we make judgments about people that quickly all the time—blink, blink. (You’re probably drawing some conclusions about me right now.)
Bo talked to us about safety.
“Safety comes first at New Directions. Well, actually the clients come first as Ms. Pettigrew just made clear. But safety comes second. Or maybe third, since profit comes first or second.”
He laughed at the last bit and expected us to laugh as well, but none of the five new hires in the room reacted at all.
“That’s a joke of course.”
I nodded, though not quite as vigorously as when Ms. Pettigrew asked if everything was clear.
Bo went on to explain some of the safety rules, which were legion, and he gave us a fat notebook that chronicled the top few hundred rules, policies, practices, and procedures. Things like what to do if one of the clients pulled a fire alarm without cause (call the main office), or was reported missing (call the main office), or stabbed one of the staff with a fork (call the main office).
Anyway, that was the training session.
I’ve since broken a number of the rules I learned in that session, but so far I’ve gotten in trouble only once. It was when I was trying to teach J.P. how to tell time. They prefer that clients learn to read a traditional clock face. And my job, for thirty minutes each week during my shift, is to help him do so.
J.P. does not look . . . cognitively disabled. Since J.P. is an adult, he is not developmentally disabled, because he is beyond the normal age of development. So he is cognitively disabled, which I’ve discerned is slightly but measurably more appropriate than intellectually disabled, perhaps because it’s slightly more obscure and obscurity is highly prized when one is trying to speak about conditions that are, let’s not say undesirable, but certainly not highly sought.
But just between you and me (are you Nobody too?), I’ve streamlined all this for myself. I’ve divided the world into Specials (note the honorific capital S) and Normals (capitalized not to honor “normal” but to parallel the capitalization of Specials). I mean, we refer without embarrassment to special education and Special Olympics and special needs, so I’ve just reduced the wide world of cognitive disability to Specials. It simplifies things for me, and, believe me, I need things simple. I use the word with clean hands—disparaging no one, and with as clear a conscience as a borderline psychopath can muster. (I’m