In Seeking Meaningful Work, I Found a Community Willing To Open Up Their Lives To Me

In Seeking Meaningful Work, I Found a Community Willing To Open Up Their Lives To Me

Nash Boone

My last job feels like another life. In my previous work, I often found myself in court opposite of disabled, elderly, and otherwise vulnerable people. It felt like a hollow mission, but often you can find yourself going through the motions of everyday life without stopping to think about what really matters. More and more, I found myself thinking of how I could put my skills to use, to change course and eventually I found a listing for a job at Disability Rights Pennsylvania and jumped at the opportunity. I saw DRP as a civil and human rights organization that was pushing the needle forward improving lives. I wanted to be a part of that.

Soon, I found myself in the thick of it—visiting people with disabilities in facilities so that they had the opportunity to open their worlds to me to better their environment. Plunging headfirst into disability advocacy, I find myself learning new things every day, but am grateful to be surrounded by both fellow DRP advocates and disability community members who take the time to teach and challenge me. I have begun to reevaluate everything I have been taught about disability and question how we represent disability as a society. Media has trivialized, demeaned, and largely ignored the experiences of disabled people to the point where we are overlooking the very real issues the community faces daily. It is these very stereotypes we seek to combat by advocating alongside the disability community. We have a lot of work to do.

My first visit to a facility shook me. It was the first time I could see, before me in person, the difference in how we are taught people with disabilities are treated versus the reality. While I had conducted interviews and monitoring virtually due to the pandemic, physically being there was a wake-up call. We so often forget that there are people living in conditions where they don’t feel heard, cared for, or that they have the ability to set the goals and desires for themselves. I could see that on full display when stepping through the doors that day. It was jarring but continued to confirm the necessity and urgency of the work we do. Our ability to carry out our mission is often life or death for so many—protection and advocacy.

In working any job, you can get caught up in focusing on the work that is before you, but in collaborating with other advocates at DRP, I have found that there is a massive scope to the work we are doing. Everything that I am afforded in society should also be afforded to disabled people and that is what stays on my heart when I listen to the experiences of community members. Equity is our ultimate goal for this work.

You can help us reach it by contributing to our work today.