Forty-something Chicoan Jennifer Kuhns (http://www.jenniferkuhns.net) has published more than a dozen books. “I write children’s books,” she tells readers in her latest memoir, “most of which have a disabled protagonist with a strong and positive character and attitude. Well, maybe a little bit of a snarky attitude… What can I say? I put a little bit of me into all of my characters.”
Her own story is told in “Little Diva On Wheels: Growing Up Differently-Abled” and now “Even Broken-Winged Divas Can Fly” ($16.95 in paperback from Shalako Press), focusing on her high school and college days. Born 10 weeks early, diagnosed with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy, Kuhns notes that while “my fine motor manual dexterity is basically non-existent,” she has “the ability to memorize like a freaking elephant.”
This “broken-winged diva” has a penchant for literary symbolism, “a strange sense of humor,” a competitive instinct and self-advocacy.
Her cerebral palsy affects speech. “I can say the word. The problem is ‘saying’ and ‘enunciating’ a word are two absolutely, completely, different animals.” Most of her family members, friends and those who have interacted with a disabled person understand what she calls her “CP-babblestics.” She is “greeted, not ignored. I was spoken to, not at. I was not made to feel like I had leprosy. And I was verbally understood.”
Perhaps other adults lack the patience or are afraid, but there is no rancor in Kuhns’ description. Instead, she reveals a well-rounded life, including raising a sheep and an awkward relationship with her mother: Mom is the boss at home, but she is also hired as an aid by the Department of Rehabilitation and so Jennifer is her boss at school .
“I’ve not always been happy about my condition, my situation in life. I’ve been mad, and I’ve been sad, and I’ve hated the body I’m in.” And yet, “I know how to harp like nobody’s business to get what I need, want, or think I should have… not that it always works.”
A color section at the end showing some of her tattoos (one for each book published), receiving her master’s in arts degree, and newspaper clippings, demonstrates that something very much worked.
Dan Barnett teaches philosophy at Butte College. Send review requests to dbarnett99@me.com. Columns archived at https://barnetto.substack.com