2005-08-27 - 9:13 p.m.
Last night I got the Nod. You know. Someone nearby acknowledges you as some sort of fellow traveler and you trade nods at each other. �Sup. �Sup. I�ve gotten it a few times before, usually from other guys in rooms full of women. I�m a guy; you�re a guy. We�re guys. �Sup. And I�d have received it a lot more if I were black or something. There�s all these white folks around here. I don�t know you, but you look like me. �Sup.
I was in Boulder waiting on the Pearl Street mall after N.�s show. A guy about my age came out of a restaurant in a wheelchair. He saw me in my chair and we did the nod at each other. �Sup. A relatively insignificant exchange, but it�s made me think more about my identification with other people with disabilities. I sometimes read how people with disabilities are America�s largest minority group. But is it really a �group�? Or just a �bunch�?
When identity politics became hot in, say, the 1960s, people became grouped together who may not have otherwise had an affinity for each other. I�m an accountant who�s an Astros fans into Coltrane. You�re a janitor into the Knicks and P-Funk. But the social injustice we both face as blacks trumps these differences and makes us bonded where we might not normally even talk to each other.
Has society moved beyond this rationale? Are our variations as individuals now given more weight than our commonalities? Isn�t this the true meaning of �diversity�? Or is it an unhelpful atomization that makes it all but impossible to draw strength from numbers in any shared identity? How much do I really have in common with the mentally disabled? With people with physical disabilities who don�t use wheelchairs? With people who do?
What�s my master status, my bottom identity? Punk rocker? Brooklyn boy? Soon-to-be Chicagoan? Urbanist? Minor-league baseball enthusiast? N.�s boyfriend? Crip? Aren�t all of these a part of me? Do I have to rank them?
� 2005 Geoff Gladstone
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