"How would you like a crutch up your ass?" That's what she really said, and on occasion I actually heard her say this. We were friends more than thirty years ago, during my salad days of bar and street Christian ministry downtown. She would have been in her early twenties, getting around on crutches because of her cerebral palsy. She was, shall we say, legendary? I believe I have already mentioned her on these pages on one of my Remarkable People I Have Known posts.
She made the crutch up your ass remark to an individual in a club when he came running over to her while she was on the dance floor, twirling quite ably to the music on her crutches, telling her how brave she was. She was a force to be reckoned with. I remember one evening we were visiting together in a local pub. I stood up to reach for my wallet while paying for my beverage and suddenly yelped from a sharp, searing pain on my backside. There she was in her chair with one of the wickedest grins I have ever seen. She had just bitten me on the ass and someone from the next table announced to her, "you're not getting older, you're getting worse!"
Well, so it goes.
Just last Sunday or so I was listening to a program on the radio, an interview with a New York artist who lives with a disability and gets around with difficulty, but still with success. She commented that one day she was outside jogging. It would be very clear to see her while jogging that she had a disability. Suddenly, a man she had never met before came over to tell her what an inspiration she was. She told him to fuck off.
Several months ago I was at a meeting with one of my clients, his case manager and the occupational therapist, who is also my supervisor. It was, for the most part a very successful encounter and everyone felt very good about the way things were progressing. Then at the end the case manager, in an effort to compliment me, told me what a good role model I was. I thanked her while trying desperately to control my gag reflex.
What do these three incidents all have in common? Three individuals justifiably offended by ablism.
My old friend with cerebral palsy, the New York artist with mobility challenges, and me, recovered from trauma and still being treated by my superiors as though all I am able to be is a good role model because I carry for them the stigma of mental illness.
We are sick and tired of being called brave, inspiring and good role models. We are sick and tired of ablist idiots, themselves also crippled with neurosis and fear, making themselves better than we are by throwing us patronizing crumbs and scraps of bread. We are better than this and they don't want to know it. They are afraid of us because they instinctively know that if they ever found themselves in our shoes they would never be able to cope.
Which also gives us a certain power over those idiots.
There is a wisdom that comes through trauma, and it only comes to us through trauma. Our souls, violated, and broken into, are also split open, making us more compassionate, more knowledgeable of the human condition and more human.
Gentle Reader, I remember during the seventies and eighties when upper-middle class angst was the queen of first world problems. These well-off white folk with time on their hands and all their needs fulfilled and feeling somehow...empty. Unfulfilled. I remember some of these people from churches I attended during that time. To them, God was all about fulfilling their inner needs, receiving inner healing, and finding a sense of purpose in the midst of all that awful, neurotic angst. Some of them actually were motivated to do something constructive. They dumped their affluent middle class life style and devoted their lives to serving and caring for the poor and traumatized of the world. I think that some of them were also traumatized by osmosis.
We either walk into the fire or the fire is going to find its way into us. Either way, we are still going to get burnt. It's unavoidable and it is inevitable. Embrace the flame, before the flame can embrace you.
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