Change?

 

I’ve talked before about how if one of my assistants goes out and about with me enough times, someone will inevitably refer to them as my son (or daughter.) It doesn’t matter if  my assistant is white or black or Latino or Asian or whatever. It’s happened to them all.

Usually what happens is someone sees me being assisted outside my home by one of the people in my pit crew, which is what I call the people who help me every day to get out of bed, etc. And the observer is curious about the nature of our relationship because most people’s idea of how things work is that the people who assist cripples every day are nurses or some sort of medical professionals. But my pit crew people don’t wear surgical scrubs or nurse-looking garb, They wear regular civilian clothes

 And so the observer concludes that if this person is not a medical professional then they must be from my family because those are the only other people who regularly assist cripples. Thus, observer says something like this to my pit crew person: “Its really great the way you help your dad.”

Something similar even happened to my pit crew member, Victor, although he’s older than me and black. Victor accompanied me to a pharmacy to get a vaccine. The pharmacist didn't seem to know what to make of us, probably because Victor wore civilian clothes and he was too old and black to be my son. So the pharmacist says to Victor, “Are you his guardian?”

I’ve also said that I look forward to the day when this doesn’t happen anymore because I think the level of confusion reflects how little a lot of people know about how cripples like me make our way through the world. It shows that too many people still assume that cripples who need as much help as I do either are sent off to nursing homes, where the medical professionals can look after us, or family helps us out for free. They have no idea that there are public programs like the one through which I hire my pit crew. I place ads and interview people and I hire the people I want and I set the schedule and determine the tasks and they get paid with state funds for being my assistants. It’s a great alternative to going into a stinkin nursing home or relying on family to help for free.

So the day when pedestrians stop thinking my assistants must be my offspring will be the day when it’s not so hard to imagine cripples getting assistance in the socially-cooperative manner that I do.

Well recently I went to a car repair garage with one of my pit crew guys, who is 23. And the mechanic says to me, “Is he your grandson?”

Things have changed, but not in the way I hoped.

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Of Predators and Prey

 

There’s one thing that seems to make humans unique from other species of animals. As far as I can tell, humans are the only animals that switch sides and join up with their predators so as to try to convince them to change their ways.

Like for instance, you don’t see a hen hanging out with foxes, just so the foxes won’t fuck with them.

But humans do that kind of stuff all the time. Just take a look at the republican party. There are the Log Cabin Republicans, who are gay. They think republicanism is great, except for that homophobic stuff

And there are a few black republicans, too. They think republicanism is great, except for that racist stuff.

There are Joe Worker republicans who seem to think that the republican party is on their side.

 Well you can’t have it both ways. If you scoop all the homophobia and racism and screwing over working people out of republicanism, there isn’t much left. It’s just as silly as if the hens hung around with the foxes, hoping they could convince foxes not to eat hens anymore. It ain’t gonna happen.

If the foxes did allow hens to mingle among their ranks, they would probably use them as unwitting decoys. to lure in their fellow hens. Their job would be to convince the other hens that the foxes aren’t such bad guys after all. Once you get to know them, you'll see that the foxes really do have the best interests of hens at heart. And once enough hens flew the coop and came on over to the other side, the foxes would gobble them up. That’s what being a fox is all about.

It works the same way with the republicans. As soon as enough gay and black  Joe Worker republicans convince enough of their own kind to come on over because this is the place to be, the republicans will gobble them up. That’s what republicanism is all about.

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Down Syndrome Reveal Party

 These days you can know what gender your future child will be before it is even born. And so some people throw one of those silly gender reveal parties, where they tell all the invited guests whether the fetus is a boy or a girl. But the information is delivered with great fanfare. Dozens of pink or blue balloons might be released into the air. Or maybe a plane might fly overhead pulling a banner that says IT’S A BOY or IT’S A GIRL. There might even be fireworks involved somehow.

You can even purchase items for gender reveal parties.  For instance, there are gender reveal smoke bombs and confetti cannons.

These days you can also find out a lot of other things about your future child before it is even born besides gender. You can find out whether or not it will be crippled and if so how. You can find out if the kid will be crippled for the same reason I am. And when that happens, people don’t start thinking about having festive events to celebrate their fetus. People instead start thinking about aborting the damn thing.

That’s how a lot of fetuses that will eventually become people with Down Syndrome get aborted. I don’t think there ever has been such a thing as a Down Syndrome reveal party. No, the best a fetus like that can hope for is that the mom will quietly continue with the pregnancy.

Throwing a Down Syndrome reveal party would be considered by polite society to be tastelessly disrespectful. The proper etiquette for an occasion like this would be to have a somber event that’s more like a funeral. Everybody shows up and offers their condolences. No confetti cannons or  fireworks or anything like that. That could be seen as making light of tragedy. If there are any theatrics at all, it might be releasing black balloons into the air.

Giving birth to a regular, standard-issue baby is looked upon as one of those joyous occasions in life that's worthy of high celebration. But giving birth to a crippled baby is something else altogether.

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Poppy Day

 

 We don’t seem to have Poppy Day around here anymore.

When I was a kid, it seemed like Poppy Day happened at least once a year, if not several times a year. I knew it was Poppy Day if I was out riding around in a car because whenever we’d get stopped by a red light people would walk out into the intersection with slotted cans in one hand and red flowers in the other. They’d come up to car windows shaking the cans so that the people inside the car could hear the coins in the can clanging around and if someone rolled down the window and dropped a few more coins in the can they’d receive one of the red flowers as a token of appreciation.

My mother always enthusiastically rolled down her window and dropped coins in the cans on Poppy Day. And she’d display her poppy by tying its stem to the rearview mirror. I noticed that the poppy wasn’t even real. It was made of cloth. So I asked my mother why she was so eager to buy and so proud to display a fake flower. She explained that the poppy was a symbol of something of far greater importance. When she purchased a poppy, she was helping the handicapped because the poppies were made by handicapped people.

I also noticed that right around Poppy Day a lot of people had cloth poppies hanging from their rearview mirrors. So, I guess displaying a poppy had the added benefit of showing everyone that you help the handicapped.

I think it’s a good thing that they don’t have Poppy Days anymore. It shows that cripples have bigger and better things going on than making cloth flowers. But sometimes even today when I’m waiting for a red light I get solicited to give money for cripples. But it’s the cripples themselves that approach my car, not their surrogates. These cripples shake canisters full of coins. But the canisters are usually more makeshift, like used cups from fast food restaurants. And if I give them coins, they just say thanks and move on to the next car. They don’t give me a poppy or anything.

Without a poppy to display. how is everyone going to know that I help the handicapped?

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A Certified Role Model

 

People sometimes tell me I’m a good role model for criplets. But I have a hard time seeing myself as a role model because I don’t really know what a role model is. There are no standards or anything.

Don’t get me wrong. I’d like to go around being a role model. If nothing else, it might be a way to make a few bucks.

But what qualifications do I have to call myself a role model? Just because I’m an adult cripple who’s managed to accomplish a few things in life, big deal. Is that all it takes to be an official crippled role model? I sure hope not.

And I ‘ve always been suspicious of cripples who brazenly go around acting like they’re everybody's big-time role model. You know what I ‘m talking about. It’s those motivational speaker types. They make me not want to be a role model for sure. To quote the great 20^th Century philosopher Groucho Marx, I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.

I’d feel a lot more confident if there was some kind of state licensing test I had to pass to be allowed to call myself a role model.The first question would be, “What the hell makes you think you’re a role model?” I’d be too intimidated to answer that question so I’d give up taking the test right then and there and I‘d never get certified. But at least I’d know for sure that I’m not a role model.

I’d also feel more confident being a role model if role models were required to have malpractice insurance. One of the things that holds me back from declaring myself a role model is I’m afraid of being sued. What if some criplet decides he wants to be like me and finds out the hard way that was a bad idea? It's bound to happen. And there’s bound to be some ambulance-chasing lawyer out there who will gladly take the case.

I guess that’s why I resist being  a role model so hard. It’s too much responsibility.

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Please Don't Jump into a Freezing Lake on My Account

I, Smart Ass Cripple, do hereby solemnly swear that I will never be the type of cripple who makes uncrippled people dive into a freezing cold body of water in the dead of winter just to raise money for them.

It seems like every week in winter I see a local news report about a group of uncrippled people who, presumably, are otherwise sane and rational, going to the beach on a frigid day, stripping down to their bathing suits and jumping in the lake. To get people to do stuff like this you’d better have a damn good reason. And what better reason is there than raising money for cripples?

In Chicago, they jump in the lake in winter to raise money for the Special Olympics. There’s something sadistic and tyrannical about that, making people freeze their asses off for you. It sounds like something a spoiled little 10-year-old king would do to the peasants for laughs.

I know nobody is holding a  gun to anybody’s head and making them jump into a frigid lake. But if those people were raising money for me, I’d be horrified. I’d feel obliged to go down to the beach with a bullhorn and shout, “What the hell are you people doing? Are you nuts?  Go home and get warm!” If I was in the Special Olympics, I'd mess up their whole gig.

No offense, but I would never jump in a freezing lake for you. There would have to be a helluva lot at stake for me to make me do that. Someone would have to be holding my family hostage and threatening to kill them, or something like that.

So if anybody out there ever feels so sorry for or inspired by me that you’re ready to raise money for me by taking a flying leap into a freezing lake, please don’t. You can just write me a check instead.

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More Smart Ass Cripple Tips for Young Criplets

 Like I said last time, I always love giving tips to young criplets about ways I’ve found to navigate through the world as a cripple.

Here are some more: Never wear underwear or pajamas but always wear slip-on shoes.

I learned these valuable lessons because the high school I attended was a state-operated boarding school for cripples, which I affectionately refer to as the Sam Houston Institute of Technology (SHIT).

The great existential question every inmate faced was, "Is there life beyond SHIT?” SHIT was a bubble. There were staff to meet our needs. The people who helped us get in and out of bed were the houseparents. There were therapists aplenty.

But what happened if an inmate graduated or reached age 21 and couldn’t live at SHIT anymore? Without the houseparents around, who was going to help us get in and out of bed?

The therapists thought their job was to help me figure out how to do as much of that kind of stuff as I could for myself. They devised elaborate, makeshift technology, like long sticks with hooks and snaps and pulleys on them, to help me do stuff like pull up my socks. It didn’t matter if it took me all day to pull up my socks. The important thing was that I did it myself.

And so I came up with all kinds of shortcuts. I wouldn’t have to worry about putting my pajamas on without any houseparents around if I slept naked. I wouldn’t have to figure out a way to wiggle my underwear on and off if I didn’t wear any. I wouldn’t have to waste any time tying my shoes if I wore slip-ons.

These are the things I did to ensure my survival beyond SHIT. I still don’t wear pajamas or underwear because, well, what’s the point? And not buying those things saves money, too. I sometimes wear shoes that have laces, but regardless of what kind of shoes I wear, I have someone else put them on me. There’s a crew of people that I’ve hired to do all that kind of stuff for me. I call them my pit crew. They’re all paid an hourly wage but it doesn’t cost me anything, except when I pay my taxes. The state government covers it all.

 I hope these tips aren’t as relevant as they once were. Fortunately, there are a whole lot more of these programs around, so today’s cripples don’t have to stress about doing everything yourself or going broke paying someone to help. But there aren’t nearly enough of these programs and a lot of cripples can’t get the help they need. So my tips may prove to be helpful  after all.

Oh crap! I just remembered that a few years back, I was invited to be the commencement speaker at SHIT. I’m one of their prize alumni. (Do you see why I call it SHIT?) I talked all kinds of shit to the graduating criplets, but I didn’t share these tips with them. Sorry about that, criplets. Maybe the SHIT people will invite me to speak again.

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