I Coulda Been a Contender!
Are you watching the Paralympics? You will find an event that you think is cool.
I Have Been Watching Para-Boccia on the Paralympics!
Last night, l watched my first event at the 2024 Paralympics in Paris. I am happy to say that it looks like Peacock is covering the actual competitions as thoroughly as it covered (The Temporarily Abled) Olympics, minus a lot of the hype and Snoop Dog.
So, Para Boccia was on when I went looking for something live to watch at midnight. In the privacy of my bedroom, I said to my husband, “Look, actual disabled people!” I uttered this political incorrectness because the other clips I had seen of this year’s games didn't portray anyone who looked remotely as disabled as I am.
The picture above is actually of one of the more “able” para boccia athletes I have seen. (From the 2020 Paralympics.) People in power chairs with assistants is more my speed. It is a game I could have played. (Please, please, no “it is never too late comments!”)
Another “When I was a kid” Story
When I was in special education for elementary school, we had a few adapted games: T-ball, volleyball, and my favorite, table shuffleboard. One of my teachers made the table—he spray painted the shuffleboard triangles layout on a cheap wheelchair-height table the was long enough for two wheelchairs to sit side-by-side on each side of the table.
The “pucks” were little lightweight plastic rings, and we hit them with balsam wood sticks. Many of the friends I played this with, including my partner, Mike, were boys with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. The design of this game was perfect for them because playing took the slightest effort of the wrist; we could even help them get their arm on the table, if necessary.
Mike was a very quiet kid who loved to follow baseball. We became friends over the table shuffleboard because we both very thoughtful and strategic in how we played. For both of us, it satisfied a need for competition of some kind, something more immediate than checkers or chess.
If there had been para-boccia on our radar, I think we both would have been very interested, even if we were in different categories, different levels of disability. Those differences made no difference to table shuffleboard, because my greater upper body strength gave me no advantage in that delicate game.
Even though Mike passed in the 1970s, I still think of him now and then with fondness and a sense of loss.
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The only thing that isn’t comparable to the Temporary-Abled (love that!) Olympics is that they did a “Primetime in Paris” special every night for three hours that covered a lot of the top events from the day. I was hoping for something similar with the Para Olympics. And I secretly hoped Snoop Dogg would return to Paris for these games. He could have brought some new audiences to the world of para sports, methinks.