I learned a lesson the hard way when I was a small child. Back in the fifties and sixties there was a small yellow Schoolbus run by the Harvey Company. They would go by and pick up all the Special Education kids at home and drop them off at school and then at the end of the day they would drop them off at home. Well, like every other kid I made fun of the special kids. We called them Harveys or retardos, or any other name we could think of. Kidscould be cruel.
In the middle of second grade it turned out I had a hearing problem. It runs in the family. Since the school had no deaf or hearing impaired program, I was pulled out of my school and bused to another district. Guess which bus I had to ride in? Yup, the yellow Harvey bus. I had to endure the same taunting and teasing that I once did. On top of that I had to wear a large hearing aid box about the size of a shoebox, with various dials on it and large earphones about the same size as ear protectors. It was humbling experience. This went on for three years. I learned the hard way to never laugh at another persons misfortune. As the saying goes, there but for the grace of God go I. Truer words were never said.
