July 26 brings back fond memories of watching, with my parents in attendance, Bush I sign the ADA into law on the White House lawn.  I worked as a Congressional committee staffer behind the scenes in strong support of that law.  I shared with my wife that yesterday was the 20th anniversary, before I knew there was any press on that, and she told me, yes, there was a fair amount of press on that.   

I was 31 years old when the ADA became law.  I felt at that time as though, no matter what else I did or didn't do the rest of my life, I had done at least one thing truly worthwhile to improve the human condition.  

Getting to know those disability advocates was an incredible growth experience for me.  I have been unable to think about disability--indeed, societally defined "difference--in the same way since that time.  The people with disabilities that I met had such extraordinary personal stories of hardship and loss and literally going from being unemployed to being senior advisors to the President of the United States on this legislation, or key advocates leading the way towards a brighter future for people with disabilities.  

So many of them have died, many at young ages.  My best friend in the disability advocacy community was Howard Moses.  He was the finest public servant I have ever met, incredibly productive.  I had the chance to work under him at the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission after I left my job with Congress.  He had cerebral palsy, mild, which left him with an ungainly walk, a mild speech impediment, and a hand tremor.  He was also a recovered alcoholic.  And he was gay.  I found it somehow poignant that the "handicap" he felt most self-conscious about, by far, was his homosexuality (not a disability, of course).  He was HIV positive but was kept alive many productive years with the cocktail medications available at that time. He had been married earlier.     

We got together from time to time after I'd left Congress and EEOC.  He had told me he was going back to Kansas to see his parents.  It wasn't until after the funeral that I found out he had died.  There was, I was told, quite a gathering of people at that event and I really, really wish I could have been there to honor his memory. 

While he was extremely tough he had the greatest warmth of personality of any human being I have ever met.  There was an incredible gentleness, compassion, and humanity to Howard.  He had a wonderful, warped sense of humor, too.  Plus a devilish side to him that was all the more endearing for the contrast with his overall saintly image.   

For some time after he died, I kept a picture of him in my office.     

The deaths, at relatively young ages, of so many of these people I had gotten to know reinforced my sense of the abiding fragility of life.  My mother had been in a bad car accident and suffered a traumatic brain injury while Congress was considering the ADA.  I'd already been "adopted" by the disability advocates as one of their favorite what they call "ABs" (able-bodied advocates).  So that when my mom had her accident things didn't change in that regard.  I guess, if anything, I was a little more "adopted" after that.  They knew how I felt before my own family experienced devastating consequences of sudden-onset traumatic disability. 

The ADA might also have been named the "Parents with Strollers Act of 1990" or the "Infirm Persons of Any Age Act of 1990", I suppose.   

I consider myself incredibly fortunate to have had that experience.  Not many Hill staffers have the opportunity to be a part of the passage of landmark legislation.  We are the first country in the world to have passed comprehensive civil rights legislation protecting people with disabilities.  I'm proud of that.