Look outside the shoe

I first saw Jessica Cox on TV and like everyone else who saw her, I admired how she went beyond her disability – she was born without arms – and did stuff that not every able-bodied person could do. Like fly a plane. Or surf. I don’t even apply makeup with the same expertise that she does and yet I have hands. She does so with her feet. 



Anyway, I viewed that segment on that early morning news program with the same detachment that I view novelty shows. Entertaining, yes, but not really relevant.

And then I had the chance to see her when she was invited as one of the motivational speakers in a conference that our company hosted for its employees.

What struck me was that she was very normal. She made everything seem normal. And yet you couldn’t forget that she had no arms because it was just staring you in the face. She was just so self-sufficient and unself-conscious about her disability (she prefers to call it condition) that to dwell on it would make one seem rather patronizing.

I was amazed at her total acceptance of her condition and her refusal to make it an excuse for non-achievement. She shared how desire, persistence and fearlessness can drive success in any endeavor.

The simple act of tying shoe laces, for example, had her momentarily stymied in grade school when they were taught how to do it. She knew she would be excused because of her condition, but she wanted to show that she could do it – just like everybody else. She knew that if she put her feet inside the shoes and sought to tie the laces – she would never be able to do it. And so she tied them first then slipped them on. Since then, when faced with seemingly difficult tasks, she seeks to “look outside the shoe”.

Needless to say, she wears more convenient shoes nowadays – those that do not have laces. :-)

By the end of her talk, I was inspired by her spirit and shared the talk with my husband. He, too, had seen the early morning interview on TV so he knew what I was talking about. Like me, he had also marveled at how she refuses to be limited by her condition. He, however, wondered at how flexible she would still be using her feet when she reached old age.

I do not have an answer for that. But I am sure, that when rheuma and arthritis strikes Jessica Cox in her old age and limits her ability to use her feet to put on her contact lenses, for example, -- she will do as she has always done: Find a way around it by ‘looking outside the shoe’.