Look Both Ways

There is no accurate portrayal of my life that excludes the lessons I have learned or the manifestations of strength on which I have relied. These ideas are central to who I am. They are as central to who I am as are the events that have given my life structure. LOOK BOTH WAYS is a memoir. It is a book about my life, as a woman with a disability, in all its interwoven parts. LOOK BOTH WAYS is a deeply personal and highly introspective account of my life, from the time of my accident in 1990 that left me paralyzed from my neck down and dependent on a ventilator to breathe. This memoir brings to light seminal points in my life since that time: my life at Harvard, my political run for New York State Senate, my entrance into academia and the field of medical ethics. These are important to who I am but they are not, in fact, who I am. My identity is built on the lessons I have learned and the understandings I have gained about myself by virtue of the life I have lived. LOOK BOTH WAYS is a conversation with myself and with anyone experiencing struggle. It delves deeply into the emergence of and need for hope in our lives. It focuses on how we adapt to life-changing circumstances and learn to grow from them. It amplifies strength over vulnerability, empowerment over marginalization. And it puts at the very center the idea that we all have intrinsic worth and lives of value.I am a writer and have written essays, books, speeches, and articles of many sorts. LOOK BOTH WAYS is, without equivocation, the most personal and honest work I have ever written. It is perhaps the most personal and honest work I have ever read.