A portion of the essay, My Inspiration and Hope, by Harrison Dixon

My son's bus pulled up in front of our house and before the wheelchair lift had hit the ground, Mark announced that he was running for student council president. He was so excited and animated. I, on the other hand, was uneasy with the whole idea. The image of my son rolling his wheelchair around school and asking for votes did not sit well with me. I grew up in a home where we were taught to never ask anyone for anything. I didn't know what to say.

Before I could offer an opinion, Mark was at his computer, telling me that he had to make banners and buttons and write a campaign speech. I wanted to turn off the computer and try to talk some sense into him. Who would vote for a boy who could not walk, could barely feed himself, and had trouble sitting up? How could he win a student council election?

My wife, who was more optimistic about his chances, helped Mark write a campaign speech. He practiced his speech until he could recite it from memory.

I dreaded the election day. The morning of the election despite my stress, Mark was already awake, grinning from ear to ear. "Today is election day!" he shouted gleefully. His face beamed and my heart sank. I did not want him to be disappointed by losing an election when winning seemed such a long shot. I worried how he would handle defeat.

I left work early to be there for him when he got home. I thought we would go out and have a fast food treat to help him get over losing. When I heard his bus coming, I went out to wait for him. The bus door opened, and he started clapping his hands, yelling, "I won, I won." The bus driver announced, "I didn't know I would be driving the presidential limo today."

Had reality gone on vacation? How could he have won? The bus driver and his assistant were all smiles. "Aren't you proud of him?" one said. He was so full of himself that I had to hold his hand to get him to stop talking long enough to bid the bus driver good-bye.

Together, we attended a summer student council camp with officers from other schools. The majority of the activites were designed for children who could stand up, cheer, sing, and do various marches. Though they were very kind to us, Mark and I found ourselves watching the cheering and marching instead of actively participating.

My life is divided into two periods and the dividing line is clear and distinct: the birth of my son, Mark. Pronounced dead by an obstetrician and baptized twice at two hospitals, Mark decided to survive being born sixteen weeks prematurely. Now 11 years old, Mark has a multitude of physical challenges that require awesome amounts of time, resources, and energy.

His birth was the first leg of an emotional roller coaster that I continue to ride. When he survived the on-slaught of problems associated with an extremely premature birth, we knew that Mark would be challenged in some way. Over the years, we have constantly re-assessed our expectations: most of our revisions for Mark's physical abilities have been downward. As he grew, I saw that there were many physical skills that Mark would likely never master.

As Mark gets older, I find that his mother's perceptions and mine diverge. As a man looking at a manchild, I have concerns that she can only imagine. At the age when I would have expected to teach him how to hunt and fish and to take him to baseball games, I find myself teaching him how to hold a cup to his mouth.

As he approaches his teenage years, I can see his personality developing and trying to express itself through obstacles presented by his physical disability. Sometimes, Mark will say or do something that my father or my grandfather or I would be expected to do, and, for a brief moment, he is a perfect representation of one of his forefathers. It's as if our genes are emerging in his spirit. His physical disability causes him to unconsciously mimic my father and grandfather as I remember them as old men.

Sometimes, I try to understand what goes on in his mind. He usually seems happy with the trappings of his world, the things that he can manage, handle, and control. I worry that maybe he is too happy with his little controlled world. For instance, sometimes I feel he should be outside, following his dad around, doing the things that men do. Yet Mark seems content to be in the kitchen, reading recipes to his mother. I wonder: does he enjoy these activities because it's what he wants to do or because it is all he can do? Are our spirits pruned by our circumstances? Do we all find contentment in what we can do well and exclude others?

I find myself wondering if the relationship and the activities that fathers and sons share are all that important. Then I find myself rebelling against that thought. I have seen men who have taken comfort in this fantasy lose a precious relationship, and, feeling unnecessary, become absentee fathers.

A child's challenges ask much of each family member, but the emotional toll may be greatest on the father. As a father, often I am placed in situations that require mindsets that are new for many, if not most men. While nurturing comes naturally to my wife, I have had to learn it with few role models to follow.

Often, I fail miserably at the nurturing that I am called upon to provide. It is a challenge for me to do things that mothers often do with children, especially disabled children. I must manipulate my schedule to take Mark to almost all of his dental appointments. Once at the dentist's, I even find it difficult to make small talk with the mothers in the waiting room. Yet, on other occasions, I find I am also phenomenally successful at tasks that I never expected to have to perform as a father, such as persuading Mark to eat when he is exerting his few options of control--refusing to eat.