You'd have to be living under a Metro-area rock -- with no access to any local media at all -- to miss the fact that ABC's Extreme Makeover: Home Edition just completed a new home for U. of L. freshman Patrick Henry Hughes, who uses a wheelchair and is blind, and who lives with his family in the Buechel area.
The home appears to be totally accessible -- although it's hard to find out much about the access details through the fog of inspiration. Despite the almost non-stop media coverage in the C-J and on the local TV stations -- and all their websites -- the story has been played throughout as inspiration, not cutting-edge design. The phrase "the house that love built" has been the headline of at least two (here and here ) and maybe more stories in the C-J. Of course it's the Extreme Makeover folks promoting this.
But they have a willing co-conspirator in Father Hughes. The "inspiration" slant is something Hughes' father, Patrick John Hughes, seems to have been encouraging if not orchestrating for a long time. A Google search of "Patrick Henry Hughes" brings up many stories about the "selfless dad" who marches with his son in the U. of L. band, pushing his wheelchair. Most of these stories end up being more about the father's selflessness than about a college freshman's interests and lifestyle. Makes you wonder a bit. But that's not the topic of this blog posting. (If you want more on what I've learned over the years about such inspirational treatments, you might want to read this and this.)
In all of the media overkill of the last week, we finally get this:
Patrick Henry Hughes eagerly summed up his favorite feature of the new home:
"It's wonderful the fact that the house is more accessible," he said, smiling. "I can do everything by myself when I want to. It's gonna be great!"
Ah yes: that is the point. Too bad it was so thoroughly buried in the story 'Hometown heroes' honored.
I've yet to find any real coverage of what the actual access consists of. I've still got no real idea of precisely why and how Hughes is going to be able to be independent (despite his dad) in his new digs. Those are the pictures I'd like to see. Another story that didn't get reported, along the lines of actual access, comes via yesterday's press release from the University of Louisville -- about how Hughes
will be able to feel the shape and layout inside and out through a plastic model of the home, thanks to efforts at the Rapid Prototyping Center at UofL’s J.B. Speed School of Engineering.
Didn't see this anywhere in all the mass media hoopla, either.
Perhaps the most troubling thing about the way the story has been covered is that access is presented as something "special" being given out of "love" to Hughes by all the selfless volunteers.
Wouldn't it be better -- and more accurate -- to report that home access should be every person's right -- not just a lucky special recipient who gets a "gift"??
What the media coverage has done for me is a little different, maybe, than what it has done for the thousands who have watched and read and "felt good": All the coverage just makes me think of all the other wheelchair users in the community who could use access in their homes -- and could get it, if attention were paid to the issue, rather than focusing on the "inspiration" of one college-age fellow whose dad is ever-present. If Elite Homes, for example, decided to start incorporating the principles of visitability in all their new homes.
It makes me think about how little home access gets discussed at all in the Metro area. I'll try to blog a bit more on that in the future.
If this new home allows Patrick Hughes to quit having to be carried everywhere, that's a winner in my book.
I do have to wonder why the college guy seems to get lifted everywhere by his dad. Hughes the father, were he of a different mindset, perhaps, could use his son not so much as a public inspiration but as a way to draw attention to the things that should be accessible, but aren't.
Now that would be a real act of love -- with presents for a lot more folks than just one family.
