Just finished this fantastic memoir by @HabenGirma and I absolutely recommend it! An incredible window into her journey so far, and I learned so much.

The memoir was full of fascinating stories of her lived experience, and also really funny! I read through it really fast, because it was just so enjoyable.

When I first heard Haben Girma speak, I was struck by her challenge to her audience: Why is the narrative "person with disabilities overcomes obstacles" instead of "society is inclusive, so all people have the opportunity to succeed."

My favorite part of this book is the way she really digs into that theme, and addresses examples of ableism head on to educate the reader.

Ableism is the discrimination in favor of able-bodied people, and is unfortunately really ingrained in our society. We need to actively and intentionally work against it.

I appreciated that the author readily called out examples of this type of behavior throughout the book, and explained how the behavior was rooted in ableist thought (as well as what a more inclusive approach would have been).

An unexpected bonus of this book was a great lesson in how to write killer image descriptions! The center of the book has a few pages of color photos, which of course all have great image descriptions.

For example: "An enormous iceberg, about thirty feet tall, fills most of this photo. It's a pale, almost-white blue, with a hint of yellow. I stand beside the iceberg on Mendenhall Lake, touching it with a gloved hand. This is not the iceberg we climbed."

As a sighted person, I sometimes wonder if my descriptions are too terse, or too long-winded. The photos in her book provided examples of the perfect balance!

I think everyone should read this book, but especially people in the tech industry. Technologists have the power to improve the lives of millions of people, and the only thing holding us back is our ableist mindset!