Dear Wesleyan,
How are you? Since I have graduated I have been fairly busy with a lot of really important stuff. I hope you have been keeping yourself occupied as well in my absence. I just wanted to write to let you know or perhaps remind you about a pretty cool club on campus.
This club is called Best Buddies and it represents a kind of grassroots hands-on approach to the isolation that many people with intellectual disabilities (or your preferred terminology) face in this country. Or, if you are not a hippie activist, it promotes a good old-fashioned small town get-to-know-your-neighbors way of looking out for your fellow Connecticut residents. If you’re not a good old-fashioned kind of person, you could look at it as a way to make a friend who you may not otherwise get a chance to meet. On the other hand, if you feel you have enough friends as it is, maybe you are looking for a fun and horizon-broadening way to throw some more crap (for the record Best Buddies is not really crap) on your resume. In any of these circumstances, and most likely all the others that I didn’t bother to write down, the answer is clear: Best Buddies.
Maybe you are asking yourself why I am such a rabid evangelist, and first off, I am really not comfortable with that label so please don’t call me that. But second off, it’s because I’m not only a person writing a Wespeak about Best Buddies, but I am a former Best Buddies member myself. My experience with the club was very positive, and I’m glad to have had the opportunity to be a part of it. Since I graduated, I keep in touch with my buddy by mail mostly, but I did make it up to CT to visit once. My older sister has been friends with her college buddy for almost seven years now. Keep in mind that we both have graduated and it’s not like Best Buddies is forcing us to do anything (or ever was – they’re pretty friendly people). I know that I learned a lot and enjoyed spending time with my buddy. Also, there are a lot of local people who would like to be paired with a buddy from an area college, but are not. I guess I was just thinking that maybe if more people at WesU knew about B.B. (I am getting tired of typing it out), they would maybe join. Let me stress I had no special qualifications or experience beforehand, and you don’t really need any either.
Once you join, the next step is simple. You call your buddy and say, “Hey, want to hang out sometime?” You can word it differently, and it might be polite to introduce yourself, but I am not here to teach etiquette. Then you go to Friendly’s or bowling, or to the movies or whatever, and just chill out and shoot the shit or something every other week or so. Follow up with the phone call now and then or maybe a card or letter because everyone loves to get mail. If you’ve lived in anything resembling a dorm, you probably know how good it can be to get out and see some new faces or go someplace different. So why the heck don’t you go for it?
There is a lot to gain from becoming a buddy, not only for you, but also for your buddy. You can make a difference, people. For Wesleyan, for Middletown, for Connecticut, for the U.S. of A, and for this planet called Mother Earth. I don’t want to get too pushy or sound over the top, so I’ll leave it at that.
Thank you for reading this, if anyone did, and feel free to mull over the thought-provoking matters I have laid before you. I hope you will enjoy buddiehood as much as I did.
Your friend,
Megan
Best Buddies contact info:
College buddy director Cecil Apostol (capostol@wesleyan.edu)
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