Stumbling in the Man Box
I'm watching TV with my mother, who can't hear and has long stopped caring. "Just put on Channel 7," she says. I've learned to just put on Channel 7. Nobody ever died of too much Wheel of Fortune. What I find interesting is the way that disabled in so many physical capacities, she makes the best of each bad situation, even hopeless situations. So she can't hear, but she can watch. Later on, in my home, I'm watching HBO's The Newsroom . Don Keefer (Thomas Sadoski), a news producer, is struggling with his office chair. He is on the floor in his office, has dissembled the legs, the wheels, and is changing them so that the chair will glide easier. He tells whoever it is that catches him at this that he is mechanically inclined. Later in the show we see him at his desk, seated very low. He looks like a child, too small for the man-size furniture. He leans back and the entire chair falls apart. He makes the best of a bad situation, but then, he could also...