Just finished watching Without Pity: A Film About Abilities in my class. It had me blinking back those sneaky water droplets that escape from my tear ducts. This morning definitely felt rough with the over emotions and chest pain enhanced by the movie.
There was this one part where a family is checking out the different equipment there is available for their son who can’t control a lot of his muscles. At one point one of the men there put the little boy on a neat chair with controls that were fairly easy for the child to handle and one of the controls made the chair spin. The smile and complete joy on the child’s face as he spun just made everyone else in the class and in the film want to smile and giggle along with him. You couldn’t help but smile at seeing his pleasure. Then the camera moved over to the father’s face and you could see the tears welling up in his eyes. He was so happy seeing his child being able to do that. That got me.
Next, the film introduces this little boy (Charlie) who was born without arms and only parts of his legs developed. When he’s not on his special wheel chair he rolls around to get from place to place with a lot of spunk and just like any other child he enjoys playing with his toys and friends. What I couldn’t help but notice was how great his attitude was. He exuded so much happiness and was surrounded by so much love. His best friend was this little boy who said he had one day accidentally tripped over Charlie while he was rolling on the ground. This made the class giggle because of the manner in which he said it. Then you got see how much Charlie’s best friend cared for him and just was there for him. There was a scene were they’re both out in the playground during recess playing in the sand and Charlie is all covered in sand from rolling around in it. Then after they’re done playing his best friend picks him up and brushes him off and makes a funny face as he’s patting away all the sand that is stuck on Charlie. But just seeing the way that his best friend interacted with him and seeing the way he held him as he carried him off the play ground…it was beautiful. I like when I see these moments of the beautiful beings people can be.
Then there was also the points when Charlie would talk. His voice was so endearing. The sweetest and cutest thing ever, I just wanted to keep on listening to him. His spirit was great…it makes me happy when someone has a great spirit. So it just made my chest swell up, I felt happy and sad all at once.
Well…now I gotta head off to class number 2 before I’m late.
