On a very important topic

This is a hard blog to write, as so much in my own life seems to be changing. So much of my own life seems to be turned on its head. I am hopeful though, hopeful that good things are coming and that fresh starts are just what the doctor ordered.

Because of struggles in the past, I made a promise to myself that this blog would not contain facts about my day to day life, and I don’t want to frighten any readers. I AM okay. This blog (unlike my Facebook and Twitter accounts) is completely public. For this reason, I feel almost obligated to post this message here.  I want a lot of people to read it.

Somebody out there cares about you. Your welling-being affects at least one, if not many, many others. Let that be enough. Let that be enough to motivate you to make it. Let it be enough reason to get help. Let it be enough to force you to be truthful about your pain—to be truthful about life. Let be enough to make you look for the beauty in yourself. People, who you don’t even know, might love you. People, who have never before shown interest in your happiness, might stay awake at night thinking about you. You just don’t know who your sadness causes to be sad; there is no way to know. Do everything you can to be healthy and do everything you can to joyfully thrive. Those to whom you matter deserve it. Learn to love yourself, not to do so is ultimately selfish. If you have trouble understanding how to do that, ask someone to help. Take all the help you can get. There’s no shame in needing hands to hold. Somebody out there cares about you. Let that be enough

On Perks

Contrary to what many people think, there are perks that come with having a disability. There perks about which we joke, like getting to the front of amusement park lines, discounted train tickets, and better parking spots, and then there are the perks that matter.  Actually, it’s one huge benefit that I have never heard articulated very well until a couple weeks ago. My friend Cathy said to me, “C.P. weeds out assholes.” It  does.                                                                

I am not saying being disabled does not make it more difficult to find and make friends. That is untrue.  Bullies see people with any visible uniqueness as an easy target and it doesn't get much more visible than Cerebral Palsy. The hardest thing for me to handle as a kid was  being ignored or deemed too difficult to deal with.   The feeling of being judged very harshly for something over which you have no control is one that I’m unable to describe well. It is painful, and I guess the only other thing I can think to say is that it is exhausting. I am sure the majority of those reading this have experienced it for some reason, and for that I’m sorry. What being disabled since birth has helped me realize is that, unfortunately, a lot of people will judge me harshly for my disability, but the ones who choose not to are worth their weight in gold and chocolate.  Disabled people can trust that the friends they make are genuine. The stigma that society places on us makes it almost impossible for people to fake wanting to be around people with handicaps.  The weak are embarrassed , so we are left with the mighty. Furthermore,  personally, the  simple fact that my friends have to fold, unfold, load and reload a walker, just to have me with them says to me that they probably want me there and I’m so grateful.

I have the strongest, sweetest, truest friends anyone could ask for and the fact they can accept me means that they can accept most people. I hope more than anything that they are proud.

When Cathy made the comment quoted at the top of this post, she was speaking about romantic situations.  Pigs typically do not have the courage to date disabled women, let alone sustain relationships with them. Some guys do go in thinking that they can handle it and end up failing but that’s pretty much as bad as it gets. When one walks around unable to conceal their differences, they can only attract people who are accepting of difference, and that’s a blessing in every single type of relationship. I have seen a couple of my disabled friends fall in love with people who think the way my friends do, and it gives me hope. It may be risky for people to fall in love with those of us who are physically challenged but I think that when they do, it is probably forever. I believe that makes us ridiculously fortunate.

Do not get me wrong, the shorter lines, cheaper seats and closer parking are fun but the awesome people are definitely my favorite!

On Bad Excuses

I want to open this post by saying that I honestly admire most people with any sort of religious faith. I know that it is personal and extremely precious to those who have it and I really do believe that it mainly brings goodness to the world. Pieces of this post may make Christian readers feel like I am picking on their beliefs, specifically.  If that occurs, I am sincerely sorry. All faiths have positive and negative aspects and good and bad happenings in their history.  I reside in the Middle of the USA and the fact is, I am surrounded by Christians; almost all of the religious behavior I have seen (loving and unloving) has been theirs and not that of Jewish, Muslim, or Buddhist people.  When you read this, please know that I understand that harshness and close-mindedness is not unique to any religion, race, political party, sexual orientation, or other group.

After watching Michael Pearl be interviewed by Anderson Cooper, I just have to say:  I’m so sick of people using their religion as justification for bullying and abusing. Michael Pearl beats his kids, and encourages  his congregation to follow suit,by convincing them that God says it is okay when he says he wants children to honor their parents. Misguided individuals stand on college campuses calling people fags and hell-goers in the name of God. Sarah Palin tells her followers that women in the richest country in the world should have to pay to get rape-kits because the book that she reads doesn’t condone the Plan-b Pill.  The families of Veterans have to deal with protestors screaming at funerals because those shouting people say God would happy  that they are burying loved ones. These are just four examples of inexcusable behavior that people use faith to excuse.   Let’s call a spade a spade, this is gross!  

I am mostly agnostic but I have taken a class that required me to read and analyze a lot of the Bible. It is a text that encourages love, morality and forgiveness. Michael Pearl, Sarah Palin, funereal protestors and anyone who says different are both misreading and defiling it.  God, in my opinion, wants of us to take of each other.  Misinterpretation of scripture is not what bothers me most, however.

The year is 2011, we know, at least in part, the capabilities of the human mind to learn and evolve. You cannot use a book, no matter how holy you think it is, to explain away cruelty. Even if you believe the Bible says plainly that it is acceptable to hit children (which it doesn’t), you know better. Psychologists discovered a long time ago how damaging physical abuse is to a person’s mental health. Common decadency tells us that we all have right to  mourn sons, daughters, lovers and friends in peace and that it is more than unkind to call people derogatory names.  Common sense should tell us that a victim of rape shouldn’t be held to the same level responsibility as two consenting adults who decided to have unprotected sex.  As a society, we need to stop accepting blind faith in a higher-power as a defense. People are choosing to be mean.
All of us regardless of what color our skin is, who we find attractive, what beliefs we have, need to tell the world what we tell our kids: IT’S WRONG TO BE MEAN, especially on purpose. Period.  We can no longer afford to say: It's wrong to mean unless you really, really believe what you are saying. That line of logic not only makes no sense, but it is also one of reasons teens are killing themeselves, rapes are going unreported, parents are beating their children until they stop breathing. There is absolutely no excuse for any of that.

On Blogging.... at Least in the Beginning

I was told today, “Because you’re a writer…. You should blog.”  It makes sense. Dancers are called dancers, because others watch them dance. A man’s not a football-player if nobody has ever seen him throw a pig-skin, and one is only considered an astronaut when NASA knows they have been to space.   The easiest way to share information in 2011 is via the internet, and therefore if I want to be called a writer, I should use it to write.

 In spite of all of this, I responded to my friend’s comment by saying that I had no idea what I would say in my blog. I am not particularly interesting. I’m a typical, atypical, disabled twenty-three year-old woman. I have probably succeeded and failed as much as any other, typical, atypical disabled twenty-three year old who might read this.   I do not say this to be self-deprecating. Sure, we’re all special; ask any mother or hard-working kindergarten teacher in America. Truth be told however, if we were all particularly interesting , the names, Austin, Shakespeare, Marquez, Twain, and Joyce would be neither famous nor infamous.  These writers are both, because they thought things the rest of the world did not, and they articulated those thoughts more eloquently than the rest of the world could.  I know myself well enough to know, I do not think that deeply or speak that pretty—most people don’t.   So, why did I decide to blog? Because as this whole babbling post has hopefully established, very few of us have unique experiences, thoughts, joys or pains. This means that very few of us will be famous or infamous, but it also means that we can learn from one another. I don’t know into what this blog will evolve. I am just going to give it a shot, I’m going to blog every once in awhile and hope that somebody can relate to my words. Another incredible accomplishment of the written word is that it has given voice to the voiceless. If any friend or reader out there wants a specific topic discussed, talk to me.  I’ll do my best to lend you my voice. If in that process somebody calls me a writer, well, that’s cool, too.