Jacob’s Joy

HE CONFERENCE FLOOR WAS buzzing last May in Minneapolis, where I was speaking as president of the National Organization on Disability, a private nonprofit that focuses on increasing employment opportunities for Americans with disabilities. I wasn’t alone at the conference: My 27-year-old son, Jacob, who himself has disabilities, had traveled with me from our home in New York City. “It’s ability, not disability, that counts,” Jacob proudly told the attendees, despite complaining of feeling sick to his stomach earlier. By the time we landed back in New York the next day, Jacob was in a lot of pain. So as we had more than 40 times before, we rushed to the emergency room at New York University Medical Center, the same hospital where Jacob had been born with