Be Inspired!

Like a colt
You dart
Free and playful
Neighing giggles trailing your romps

Frisky bounding
Carefree galloping
Coltish confidence
Winds of freedom blowing your mane

Once wobbly-kneed boy
Draped in roses

With the first Saturday in May comes the annual running of the Kentucky Derby – the “Run for the Roses”!  As I reflect on this unique fervor that lives in our very own “Kentucky Home”, I’m pensively drawn to connect the Derby with my son, Sam, and with others who have Down syndrome.  As I watch the Derby, a race for three-year-old thoroughbreds, I’ll think about Sam who turns three-years-old this May.  While the Derby hopefuls’ very first breaths begin with wobbly-kneed steps, we are still anxiously anticipating the day that Sam will dart off walking on his own!  It is usually easy to be patient with Sam, and yet I long for him to feel the freedom and confidence of wind in his mane…

The horses that run for the roses in the Kentucky Derby will have trained for hours upon endless hours for this special moment, just as those who have Down syndrome have worked so hard to earn their various personal “roses”.  Maybe that rose is taking a first step, or reading a book, or swimming a lap, or making a friend, or playing a piano, or being thoughtful, or accepting a job offer, or not giving up, or learning to let go….

While the beauty and thrill of the Kentucky Derby is “the most exciting two minutes in sports”, being the parent of a child with Down syndrome has helped me to cherish the preparation, dedication, and perspiration that precede the actual race.  I am also now more aware of who often doesn’t win society’s “roses”. I know that life should not be a race governed by appearance or social etiquette, nor by productivity or profitability…or even roses.  Being the parent of a child with Down syndrome has helped me to wholeheartedly cherish and celebrate more victories.  It has helped me to unabashedly laugh or cry sometimes.  And it has reminded me that we are all after various roses, in various ways, for various reasons, with various abilities and challenges.

Don’t think of life as a race necessarily, but identify roses that are worth striving to earn, (as well as those that are not), and then work hard to earn those roses.  Celebrate victories along the way. Cherish the beauty of simple moments that will gallop away before you know it.  Imagine your once wobbly-kneed children draped in roses…because, one day, they will take off running!

Courtney Elbert (written for DSACK newsletter May 2007)
(Copyright.  May not reproduce or publish without permission from the author)