That’s me (and Luna) with Jason Benetti at a White Sox charity event.

Many of the things I take on are difficult to do without being able to see. Some are even scary.

I used to keep that to myself, afraid that admitting it would give others license to put me in a disability “box” and assume I have limitations that just aren’t there.

Enter sports broadcaster Jason Benetti, a role model for me since 2018. That’s the year he started doing play-by-play alongside baseball analyst Steve Stone for NBC Sports Chicago.

Broadcaster Jason Benetti was born with cerebral palsy, and When it comes to living above and beyond the pigeonholes some try to squeeze disabled people into, he’s my guy.

Back in 2021, Peter Sagal, the host of NPR’s “Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me,” wrote a terrific piece about Jason for Chicago Magazine. The title of the story, “The Storyteller of the White Sox,” is followed by this fabulous tagline: “If you follow the White Sox, you likely know broadcaster Jason Benetti was born with cerebral palsy. But that’s just the start of his story.”

Jason was born 10 weeks early and spent his first three months of life in neonatal intensive care. Diagnosed with cerebral palsy as a toddler, he grew up in a south suburb of Chicago. Both of his parents are White Sox fans, and for Jason, doing play-by-play for the Sox is a dream job.

And that White Sox gig is by no means the only broadcasting he does. If you’re a sports fan, you might have heard him broadcasting other Major League Baseball games, or doing college football games (he’s doing Kansas-Oklahoma on Fox as I write this) and NCAA basketball, too. Jason is smart and funny and calls the plays so well that I, his number 1 blind fan, can picture them.

In his Chicago Magazine article on Benetti, Peter Sagal paints a pretty good picture in words, too. Here’s how Sagal explains the way Benetti — and many other people with disabilities — have to adjust our own attitudes sometimes. From the article:

Jason knows people stare at him. They always have. Jason knows that his legs are oddly curved, that he walks with a full-body hitch in his step, and that his eyes point in two different directions, making people who don’t know him think he’s congenitally stupid. Jason is far too kind to put it this way, and too well mannered, but his remarkable career and potentially unlimited success isn’t a triumph over adversity. It’s a message to everybody who ever called him a gimp, to parents who told their children not to stare, to the flight attendant who asked him three times if he could handle the weighty duties of sitting in an exit row.

Peter Sagal’s Chicago Magazine article is not one about Jason “overcoming” a disability or working “despite” his disability, but one about Jason’s work in a highly-competitive field. When it comes to sports broadcasting, Benetti’s achievements speak for themselves.

My husband Mike, a big White Sox fan, read the Chicago Magazine story out loud to me when it came out. That way I wouldn’t have to hear it online in my talking computer’s robotic voice. When he got to a part where Sagal writes about Jason’s view of the tendency to make poster children out of people with disabilities, Mike said, “You know, I’ve always felt this way, too, but I never would have been able to articulate it like Jason Benetti does!” From the article:

I ask him about his role as a symbol of hope and triumph to the disabled and abled alike. He remains sensitive about it, especially the suspicion — fading but still lingering — that he got his chances to succeed only so he could make everybody else feel better. “You know those video clips where, say, the high school football team lets its disabled manager suit up and take the field and the other team lets him score a touchdown? I have an aversion to those. It’s like dropping food on a country in a famine. It’s nice and a good thing … but what’s going to happen after that?”

The part I myself related to the most came towards the end of the article, when friends from his days at Syracuse University chime in. One of them points out that back in college, Jason tripped an fell more than others did:

And we were walking one night home from a party, and he tripped and fell. And none of us cared — it was very normal. It’s not like he was being bullied by anyone…He was trying so hard to not have his disability be a factor that when it did, he … got angry.”

The angry part? I’m afraid that’s the part I could especially relate to. When coming back home after a walk with my Seeing Eye dog, I sometimes grope for a while before finding the door handle to get back inside. When crossing the streets here, we aren’t always exactly in the middle of the crosswalk. I know where the local mailbox is, but I don’t always find the slot to put the letters in right away.

I’m fine with making mistakes like that…unless someone sees me do them. Then I get flustered, worried how they’re judging me, frustrated. I read that last excerpt over again and see that my role model’s old college friend used past tense when mentioning Jason’s reaction: he got angry. That implies he doesn’t get that way anymore. Time for me to make that change, too.

I hope you’ll read Peter Sagal’s 2021 piece in Chicago Magazine. But if you want a quick take on Jason Benetti, check out this children’s book I wrote about him for anItty-Bitty Bio series that
Cherry Lake Publishing Group, an educational and children’s book publisher based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, published this year.
Cherry Lake has been publishing books for first graders for years, but this year they decided to seek out published authors who have disabilities to write about a role model of theirs who also has a disability. As one of the selected writers, of course I singled out Jason Benetti as my role model.

Earlier this year the publisher set up a Zoom meeting so I could do an online interview with Jason to learn more about him, and a month ago I had the wonderful privilege of meeting Jason Benetti face to face at a White Sox Charities luncheon at White Sox Park. I’ll leave you here with a Jason Benetti quote I especially like and used for his Itty Bitty Bio: “I think it’s good that people are all different from each other.
That way the world is ever changing, more open minded, and ever beautiful.”

ChatGPT has brought artificial intelligence—and discussions about AI—into the mainstream. On one hand, some see infinite possibilities, on the other, skeptics see aspects of dystopia. AI was a major sticking point for the writers guild during its strike, and remains an issue during the ongoing actors strike.

Major technological advances have always been seen as a panacea by some and as threats to society by others. It has always been thus. The telephone, the automobile, nuclear energy, the television—you don’t have to search hard to see that some thought technology was sure to bring either utopia or doom.

We are really good at technology. It marches on and offers us previously unimagined possibilities, as well as the prospect of it being used for evil.

But there’s the rub. It’s not the technology stupid, it’s the people. Or, as the immortal Pogo put it, “We have met the enemy, and he is us.” We’ve gone from the stone age to space travel. But after all this time, human beings haven’t figured out how to get along with one another. Until we do, technology is beside the point.

In Chicago, summer brings an avalanche of stuff to do—all around the city there are neighborhood street fests, music fests, concerts, food fairs. This year downtown rocked with Lollapalooza (an annual event), Taylor Swift, Beyonce, Ed Sheeran, and a NASCAR race. it’s like drinking from a fire hose. But it doesn’t shut off on Labor Day, and every year, a sort of ceremonial end to crazy fun season is marked by the Chicago Marathon.

I grouse about the bigger events like Lolla and NASCAR because they shut down big parts of Grant Park and nearby streets. Still, they do make for great people watching, and I’ve made peace with it all. But the Marathon I don’t just tolerate—I’ve come to look forward to it each year.

For a weekend a bunch of fit, eager people are out and about, staying at local hotels and spending money all over the place. There is a palpable excitement in the air, and something else—just a bunch of goodwill.

Usually Beth and I know someone running it, and it’s fun to stake out a spot to cheer them on for the brief moments as they stride by. Not this year, but it didn’t stop us from strolling down to Michigan and Roosevelt, very near the finish. Beth brings noisemakers, and when a group shouts the name of their runner, she joins in the chorus.

I ran a half-marathon once. When I was training for that Beth told her mother what I was doing. And Flo, the practical, down-to-earth person she was, asked, incredulously, “What do you win?” Back then I needed to lose weight after quitting smoking and re-discovering junk food of all stripes, and training helped me do that.

But these days, I’m totally in solidarity with the “What do you win” thing. The challenge, the satisfaction of meeting it—nah, not for me.

But I’m really glad that it was for the 48,000 runners yesterday, and I look forward to next year’s event.

I’m delighted to introduce Gretchen Hane as our guest blogger today. Born into a Quaker family, Gretchen lived in a small village in Michigan called Newaygo during her formative years. After graduating in 1964 from Earlham College (a Quaker school in Indiana) she moved to Chicago, earned a Master’s Degree in teaching at Northwestern University, got a position with the Chicago Public School system, taught there for 35 years and vowed never to live in a small town again.

Retired now, Gretchen tutors ESL at Truman College, attends the memoir-writing class I teach via Zoom, and wrote the following homage to teaching when I assigned “A Skill or Ability I am Grateful to Have” as a prompt.

A Skill I am Grateful to Have

Gretchen in her classroom circa 1968.

by Gretchen Hane

Few people can just walk into a classroom and teach. The art of teaching is learned through observation, experience and encouragement. When I reflect back on 35 years of teaching, I marvel at how this career shaped me from a shy, self-conscious young woman into a confident person in charge who could handle just about anything a bunch of adolescents could throw at me.

One does not become a good teacher overnight. Reflecting back on those first years, many times I would have given up without the encouragement of fellow teachers. Gradually I developed my own philosophy of survival: Be patient, creative and act like you really enjoy what you are doing. And Above all, really like the kids.

Working with adolescents taught me creativity and patience. It’s not all that difficult to sense if your class is with you. If they are not, sometimes you have to change your route, go in a new direction. What I enjoyed the most about adolescents was their willingness to let me know exactly what they thought — “so there, Mrs. Hane!” For the so-called incorrigibles, a private conversation outside of the classroom often worked.

My teaching career in Chicago spanned the gamut — from working with girls at Lucy Flower Technical High School for Girls on Chicago’s Westside to vocational coed schools on the north and south sides.

Each school provided its challenges, but each school taught me so much and helped me grow my own confidence. Fellow teachers taught me survival tactics. So did the students themselves.

One area where I needed help? Humor.

Everyone loves a funny teacher. It took me years to loosen up enough to make a class laugh, but that got easier. As the years passed, I got so I could tell a good joke!

I taught English for many years back in the day when each teacher could decide what their own classes might like to read. We were also given free range to have them write. We were not obsessed with reading scores.

With the new requirement that everyone in the Chicago Public School system had to have two years of a foreign language, I became a French teacher — a complete and challenging change of direction. I could speak French, but I was not a French teacher. I put my creative juices to work. Each year went better. My students may never have gotten beyond “Bonjour,” but somehow we had fun.

Toward the end of my years of teaching, French became a welcome relief from English. Why? Because it was not a subject that relied on test scores and principals’ reputations.

So, what made me a good teacher? I worked very hard, arriving at school early in the morning to get ready for the day. I was organized. Tolerating the disorder in the system was an unending chore. But most of all, I really liked my job.

Of course, in retrospect one forgets the bad days. But I really did enjoy the challenge of trying something different, of making something work. Most of all, teaching brought me out of my shyness. Over the years it has made me who I am as much as any familial or educational influences did.

And for that, I am grateful.

Hi All,

Last Saturday Beth and I spent a splendid afternoon on the shores of Lake Michigan on a breezy picture perfect, 72-degree day at Foster Avenue Beach. Beach is a little bit of a misnomer–it’s more of a really nice park with a beach, replete with soccer fields and the like. We were attending Ribicue, which is an annual end-of-summer gathering of Beth’s friends from her days in Scott Hall, a University of Illinois dorm. Well, at this point, they’re my friends, too, I’d like to think, because I’ve been attending with Beth for a good many years. 

Anyway, I was going to post about Saturday’s picnic until I had this inkling and did a search and … I already posted about it years ago. When I read the seven-year-old post I was delighted that it’s held up, and it pretty well describes the feeling of the gathering each year. The event is largely the same, though there was talk of Medicare and grandchildren that didn’t occur in 2016. But if anything, times like those spent at Ribicue seem to have grown even more appreciated over time. And so, I’m going to paste the old post below. And, to the generous grillmasters who make it all happen: Thanks again Don, Craig, and Jim!

Mondays with Mike: Originally posted September 26, 2016

When Beth and I moved to Chicago in 2003, she was hard at the business of promoting her first book, the memoir “Long Time, No See,” published by the University of Illinois Press. She was on the airwaves with the likes of Rick Kogan and, back then, The Kathy & Judy Show. The Chicago Tribune gave the book a good review, and Beth began appearing at libraries and bookstores around the city and suburbs, reading from her book.

Lots of Beth’s friends from high school and from the University of Illinois had settled in or around Chicago. After every media or personal appearance, it seemed she’d hear from one or another of them.

Ribicue, 2016.

But the first reconnection was a personal encounter. We were on the Red Line subway when this tall stranger peered down at Beth and said, “Ms. Finke?” She looked up and immediately realized it was Don—they’d both lived in Scott Hall, a U of I dormitory that was part of a complex called the six-pack. She learned Don lived on the North Side (though he’s an avid White Sox fan, and we’ve since attended several games with him and his wife). They were off and running in conversation until Don had to run—we came to his stop, and it was goodbye. At least for the moment.

Here’s to serendipity. Eventually, Beth was invited to something called Ribicue. This annual event is held in September at Foster Beach, pretty much come hell or high water, though those two have caused cancellations or postponements. Don and his pals Craig and Jim—the three musketeers of the Weber grills—prep the day before and hover over the grills all afternoon, cooking up an endless supply of some delicious ribs. Their stamina is amazing, and surpassed only by the obvious joy it gives them to do it.

The rest of us guests bring salads, desserts… or nothing.

On a day like last Saturday, it’s really spectacular in a lovely, laid back way. The temperature was in the 70s, the skies were clear, a stiff breeze meant you could both see and hear Lake Michigan. The best thing, of course, is just hanging out with friends.

Beth and I always take a walk along the beach.

How do you get an invite to this exclusive event? Well, sorry, you had to live in Scott Hall on the correct floor back in the day. Or know someone who did. (I won the jackpot on that.) I’ve gotten to know—and have befriended—many of Beth’s friends from Scott. We all catch up with each other. And we compare notes about our college experiences—Saturday, two of us reminisced (in some wonderment) about living in a triple dorm room. (Those triples were more like army barracks than what we call a dorm room these days, but you know, it was good for us.)

I’ve spent more than one sublime lakefront Saturday afternoon with this crew. And I’m grateful that they’ll have me, even if I did live in Hopkins Hall, and not Scott.