No, Really, The World Is Not About To End

People are uncomfortable seeing a young person in a wheelchair or using a walking aide.

It happens to me all the time. I get odd looks, I get people moving away from me in lines. I feel like a leper sometimes. Very rarely does anyone say anything about it. At least our society can still pretend to have some modicum of human decency.

I'm a reminder of the fragility of the human body. I am a giant blinking sign that says 'this could happen to you!'. I remind them that the body doesn't break down just due to old age, that no one is safe from the clammy hands of disaster. I'm not a photo in a newspaper or an image on the television, I am real and flesh and blood and cannot be easily ignored.

I imagine making myself a shirt. Something witty and clever, to bring all their fears and discomfort to light. To force them to admit that they aren't looking away and frowning because they pity me, but because they fear what I represent. I am disability. I am youth struck down. I am shattered hopes and dreams.

I want to whack them on the head and scream that really, it isn't a big deal. I'm not *really* broken hopes and dreams. I'm just somebody who can't walk all that great. There are worse things in this world than not being able to walk very good.

I once had an old homeless man make a comment. I was with Blond and Brainy, getting some beer. He was pan handling outside the liquor store. Classy. I was using a cane, hobbling about as I do, and he looked at me and said "aren't you a little too young to be using that thing?'

I bit back a retort of 'aren't you a little too drunk to be begging outside a booze shop?' and ignored him. Because of course, well all know crippling accidents only happen to old people. But they don't. And that scares people.

Rather than be scared of what could happen, wouldn't we all be happier if we didn't worry so much and just enjoyed what we had? As Hallmark-Card-Reject as it sounds, it's true. Stop worrying about all the shit that could potentially happen. Stop freaking out over mortality and getting everything done and all these horrible viruses that could exist in the future. Ignore anthrax and stop freaking out over the possibility of terrorists bombing your dinky little Podunk town.

We don't want to become a race of paranoid recluses.

Anymore than we already are, of course.