TAMPA, Fla. — He would wait each week in a tunnel near the players’ locker room after football games at Notre Dame Stadium. His spine cruelly curved, his arms and legs forever hindered by nerve disease, the boy in the wheelchair was hard to miss. And easy to ignore.
With other kids screaming for autographs and game-used items, player after player would walk past Timothy Donovan without ever noticing. Or, worse, deliberately avoiding notice.
“Most of Timothy’s life, he’s just kind of been overlooked,” his mother, Paula, said. “People just don’t see past his disabilities, and that’s sad because he’s got a great sense of humor if you just get to know him. People see what they want to see, I guess.”
