I finally got round to asking Mac if he knows what he wants to be when he grows up. I’ve always told him jokingly that he will need to get himself a good job since all the ‘disability’ things he needs are so expensive.
It was a fun conversation, it went like this…
GINA: So, Macco, do you know what you want to be when you grow up?
MAC: yes
GINA: Do you think you could tell me somehow?
MAC: yes
GINA: Could you spell what you want to be using the Macaw?
MAC: yes
MAC: (using Macaw) d – a – d
GINA: Do you want to be LIKE Dad?
MAC: yes
GINA: So, do you want to be a teacher/ lecturer like Dad?
MAC: yes
GINA: Do you want to be a teacher at school?
MAC: no
GINA: Do you want to be a teacher at University?
MAC: yes
GINA: Do you want to teach the same thing as Dad?
MAC: I don’t know
GINA: Do you want to teach Journalism like Dad?
MAC: yes
GINA: Or, do you want to teach Maths?
MAC: yes
GINA: Is there anything else you might like to teach?
MAC: no
GINA: So, you want to be either a Maths Lecturer or a Journalism Lecturer at University?
MAC: yes
They sound like pretty good choices to me.
We also talked about the other obvious option from the above conversation about Mac maybe wanting to ‘BE A Dad’. He agreed he would like to be a Dad one day. He has been very inspired by Tania at TandemMaster who is a Mum who happens to have quite significant CP, and who uses Morse Code for her communication and access. I used some of Tania’s stories with Mac when I started talking to him about morse code – seems there was more for him to learn than I imagined. Tania has been a great help to us offering advice as we move forward with the morse code option for Mac.
Here’s a news story just after Tania gave birth to her son Michael
And here’s the TandemMaster in action. We have applied for a Tandem Master for Mac to use at school. Hopefully it will get approved, in the grand scheme of disability equipment it is on the ‘cheap side’ at less than USD$500.
As many people have proven to me, not the least of them being Mac, anything’s possible.
