Thinking, Blinking and Humanity

I just watched an episode of This American Life on Netflix. TAL has been a radio show on NPR for a really long time and a few years ago Showtime made it a series. Alas, it only lasted 2 seasons. But I digress...

The episode I watched is called Escape. It was about a guy named Mike who has a muscular disorder to the point that he is completely deformed. He cannot speak, swallow, move. He can click a button with his thumb to type and he can blink and move his eyebrows. He is 27 years old and living at home with his mother.

Mike has perfect mental capabilities. He writes, jokes, curses, and is sarcastic. He just wants to be happy. When asked who he would choose to be his voice, instead of the stilted computer generated one, he answered "Either Johnny Depp or Edward Norton because they are both complete badasses."

When he said it, I felt kinda sorry for him actually. He was just so pitifully not either of those guys. But then to my complete surprise, Ira Glass says that from that point on in the show, all of Mike's emails and answers would be read by... Johnny Depp. And they were. From there on out, whenever Mike spoke it was with the voice of Johnny Depp.

I was really surprised at the effect this had on me. I immediately gave Mike's intelligence more credit. He seemed more human and tangible to me. His words seemed deeper and more eloquent. I don't think it had as much to do with it being Johnny Depp's voice (although it didn't hurt... I'm just sayin') as much as it was just a "normal" voice.

I wonder if Chris' dad feels that way having to use a servox. I wonder how many people in the world feel that way.

Mike has a girlfriend. An intelligent, non-handicapped girlfriend. People think she's crazy or perverse. I cringed when they introduced her. But after a while, I realized that she sees into him. She looks beyond his appearance and into his eyes and sees something that others don't see. I wonder if I could do that.

I have no conclusion to these thoughts. I just wanted to get them out of my head and maybe send them out into the great unknown. Maybe someone else will pick up my thoughts where I left off.