Insults

There’s this homeless guy who’s always outside my building. His presence disturbs me. Whenever I pass him he insults me.

He hangs around outside the 7-Eleven, sitting on an upside-down plastic milk crate. There’s no cushion. His butt must look like a waffle. He has a patchy beard, random tufts of white hair sprouting from his face. And when people come out of the 7-Eleven he says,”Spare change?” But he never says that to me. When I pass he just says, “Hey, how you doin'?” or “What’s up, big guy?”

Isn’t that insulting? What’s wrong with my spare change? I mean, I wouldn’t give it to him anyway. I keep my money in a bag attached to the side of my wheelchair. I can’t reach the bag so when I make a transaction the other party takes the cash out for me. So giving money to the homeless on the streets is too labor intensive and time consuming. But that’s not the point. Why doesn’t the guy perched on the milk crate not even give me the opportunity to turn him down? Does he not want to stoop so low as to ask a cripple for money? That’s not fair. When I pass a homeless person, I’m the one who’s supposed to feel a satisfying rush of condescending good fortune.

There’s another homeless guy outside the Starbucks across the street. He sells this weekly newspaper called Streetwise that homeless people around here sell to make a few bucks. At least this guy tries to get me to buy his paper. So I often oblige. But he still insults me. When he extracts the cash from my bag, he makes it a point to show me he’s taking only what he’s owed and nothing more. He does this, he told me once, because “God will never forgive me if I steal from the handicapped.”

What the fuck! It takes all the joy out of charitable giving when you can’t even feel superior!

But I’ll tell you who insulted me most of all. It was the guy at the disco. Some people believe God makes people crippled to keep them from doing something bad in life. The one time I started to believe that theory might be true was the one time I went to a disco. Because if I hadn’t been crippled I would have punched the guy at the disco in the head. But then again, if I hadn’t been crippled, he wouldn’t have insulted me so I would have had no rationale for punching him in the head.

 But anyway, I went with some other cripples to a disco. Don’t ask me why. We must’ve been delirious with cabin fever. Jim Liptak was our token vert (which is short for vertical, which is slang for people who can walk). So the guy at the disco sees us when we enter and immediately plays that insulting game called Address the Vert. He spoke only to Liptak, as if he was our translator. “Bring your friends over here,” he said. “If your friends want something to drink, tell the server.” He kept playing Address the Vert and just when I was ready to punch him in the head, he said something that acknowledged my humanity and restored my sense of equality. He said to Liptak, “Ask your friends if they want to go in the office and do some cocaine.”

We all said no thanks, but often I regret it. It would have been interesting to follow him to the office and see how long he stuck with the Address the Vert bit. “Tell your friends it’s top shelf stuff from the Caribbean.” Or maybe he would’ve gotten high with us and said something to Liptak like, “Ask your friends if they ever wondered what it's like to live on Saturn and see 60 moons in the sky.”

But at least he recognized us cripples as human beings who might want to wrench up our brains with coke, like the other people at the disco. I didn’t want to punch him in the head anymore.

A Hot Stock Tip From Smart Ass Cripple

As a public service from Smart Ass Cripple, here’s a hot stock tip, based on inside information:

Figure out whoever it is that manufactures duct tape and buy a shitload of stock in that company.

I don’t know squat about the stock market but I know lots of squat about duct tape. I can’t help it. I’m crippled. And cripples know everything there is to know about duct tape.

I looked up the history of duct tape on the internet, which is never wrong, and it seems it was first manufactured for military use during World War II and became commercially available shortly thereafter. That sounds about right because that’s about the time cripples began to emerge from the various dark holes to which we were relegated. And I’m sure duct tape had a lot to do with it.

Because the way I size up cripples is by seeing how much duct tape they have on their wheelchairs. If you want to know if a cripple is faking it, that’s how you tell. If they have no duct tape then they ain’t authentic cripples. Don’t trust them. They’re probably trying to scam Social Security or something.

Because the first thing every cripple does when their wheelchair breaks is reach for the duct tape. And then you pray to merciful God that whatever it is that broke, wrapping it in duct tape will fix it. Because otherwise you’ll have to figure out how to raise a zillion dollars to pay for the parts and labor to get it fixed. And also it’s inevitable that whatever part you need, even if it’s a screw, is manufactured only in Mongolia so please allow 4 to 6 months for shipping.

So any real cripple who tries to keep moving in the real world has the duct tape patch jobs to prove it. And it’s about to get a whole lot worse. Like for instance, they passed a law here in Illinois requiring any cripple with a broken chair to obtain prior approval for their repair from a state bureaucracy before Medicaid will pay to have the chair fixed. So that means that before you can order that screw from Mongolia, please allow an additional 4 to 6 months for the state to give you the green light.

And these kinds of austerity bombs are being dropped on cripples all over the world. Increasingly desperate cripples will be stocking up on duct tape like survivalists. Crippled survivalist is becoming a redundant term.

So the cripples are hunkering down, which is great news for Wall Street. Duct tape stocks will go through the roof! And their value will continue to rise for years to come. Because when lawmakers are asked how cripples will survive the next austerity blast, they’ll probably have to shrug and say, “Let them eat duct tape.”

Viva Roger Ebert!

A couple years ago I did a Q&A interview with Roger Ebert. Here it is if you want to read it:

http://www.itodaynews.com/april2011/IT_News_28_ME_Ebert_4-9-11.htm

I wanted to interview Roger because I was fascinated by the way he conducted himself after winding up with his new, startlingly different face when part of his jaw was removed in cancer surgery.  He wrote about it eloquently in a piece entitled ”'I'm Not a Pretty-Boy Anymore.”  It was in response to those who advised him not to attend the annual Ebertfest film festival. He wrote:

“I was told photos of me in this condition would attract the gossip papers. So what?... I have been very sick, am getting better and this is how it looks... We spend too much time hiding illness. There is an assumption that I must always look the same. I hope to look better than I look now. But I’m not going to miss my festival…”

And he found humor in the hard reality that he was no longer able to speak.

“Why do I want to go? Above all, to see the movies then to meet old friends and great directors and personally thank all the loyal audience members who continue to support the festival. At least, not being able to speak, I am spared the need to explain why every film is ‘overlooked,’ or why I wrote ‘Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.’ Being sick is no fun. But you can have fun while you’re sick.”

That last sentence caught me most. That to me was the radical essence of the message about being crippled Roger put forth just by continuing to be himself in whatever form that took on: Cripples can still have a lot of fun.

Screw you, paparazzi!

So after I conducted the email interview I added Roger to my Smart Ass Cripple email blast list. I hoped to hell I wouldn’t receive a reply from him like, “Please remove me from your silly little list! Don’t you know I’m a big celebrity?” But instead, my blog viewer stats suddenly shot up as Roger tweeted and Facebooked some of my entries. He even wrote a way-too-flattering entry in his own blog about Smart Ass Cripple. Here it is if you want to read it:

http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2012/07/a_cripple_who_is_a_smart_ass.html

I imagine just about all of you out there would never have heard of Smart Ass Cripple if not for Roger. Just about every good and positive development that has resulted from this goofy endeavor happened because of Roger.

I only met Roger in person once but I feel like he was my good friend. That’s because your most valued friends are those that offer you the most support, encouragement and kindness.

I’m not sure what I gave him in return. I hope it was that some of this Smart Ass Cripple stuff struck the same chord in him that his writings like the one above struck in me.

Anyway, I will always be grateful to my cripple comrade, Roger. So the next time you take a drink, whatever it is you drink, please offer up a toast to Roger.

Those Lucky Arthritis People

Arthritis people have a lot of nerve calling themselves crippled. They sure don’t look crippled to me. They all look happy and clean and upright and smiley.

 

I know this because there’s a glossy magazine called Arthritis Today put out by the Arthritis Foundation.  It has a lot of articles about stuff like diet and exercise for arthritis people.  And the arthritis people on the cover are always happy and clean and upright and smiley. Here’s a sample:

 

I’ve known a lot of arthritis people. Hell, I’m married to one. And I’m confused because most of them don’t look like all those people on the cover of Arthritis Today. A lot of times their fingers are gnarled and spooley and thin as twigs. They can’t turn their heads because their neck vertebrae are fused. Some ride around in wheelchairs and scooters. They really do look crippled.

 

But nobody looks like that on the cover of Arthritis Today. I don’t know why that is. It must mean that the arthritis people have either been a) cured or b) re-branded.

 

Either way, those arthritis people are some lucky cripples. Some people are trapped in crippling conditions that are so grim and hopeless that their image is beyond polishing. They’re a long way from having their own lifestyle magazine. For instance, there’s no magazine called Paranoid Schizophrenia Today. I checked because you never know. But there isn’t. If there was, the articles would be like “How to Jog Away Those Pesky Paranoid Delusions.”

 

The world isn’t ready for a magazine like that. And some crippling conditions will never have their own lifestyle magazine just because they’re too damn hard to pronounce. Like for instance, there’s Pelizaeus-Merzbacher Disease. There’s no lifestyle magazine called Pelizaeus-Merzbacher Disease Today. I checked because you never know. But there isn’t. I’m sure glad I don’t have that damn disease. It’s hopeless. You can’t even make a decent acronym out of it. There are a ton of diseases out there clamoring for attention and it’s hard to get a jump on the competition. You need more than just a sad story. Everyone has a sad story. You need an easy-to-remember acronym, like AIDS. If possible, the acronym should be catchy like a jingle. Some diseases have managed to get noticed without an acronym, like PTSD. PTSD doesn’t work as an acronym because it makes people laugh. It sounds like you’re trying to get someone’s attention by whispering.

 

But maybe it’s not so weird. Maybe the arthritis people are like every other population. There are a dozen or so magazine cover models and there’s everybody else.

Three Finger Brown's Crazy Cripple Curve

Mordecai Peter Centennial Brown was one of the greatest baseball pitchers of all time. He’s in the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. Between 1904 and 1912 he won 186 games for the Chicago Cubs.

His nickname was “Three Finger” Brown because he had three fingers on his right hand. That’s kind of weird, nicknaming somebody after what makes them crippled. That’s like Bill “Broken Neck” Smith or Sally “Traumatic Brain Injury” Jones.

And actually, Three Finger Brown's right hand had four and a half fingers. His right index finger was cut off when he was a kid and he caught his hand in some farm machinery. But all his fingers on that hand were fucked up because he supposedly fell while chasing a rabbit as a child and broke them all. So, technically, his nickname should have been Mordecai “Completely Fucked up Right Hand” Brown.

But being crippled is what made Three Finger Brown a great pitcher. Ty Cobb said Three Finger’s curveball was the most devastating pitch he ever tried to hit. Because of the way Three Finger gripped the ball in his fucked up hand, his curve jumped and dipped like no one else’s.

That was long before pitchers were paid a zillion dollars. Suppose Three Finger was twirling his crazy cripple curve today. At first, all the other pitchers would see his fucked up pitching hand and laugh and call him names and not let him join in their pitcher games. But soon they’d all be struck by a bad case of cripple envy. Soon they would lop off their index fingers and beat their other fingers with hammers, all in an attempt to fuck up their hands enough to develop a crazy cripple curve of their own. Wouldn't that be cool?

 Hell, giving up a finger is a small price to pay for a zillion dollar contract. And ballplayers will do any crazy ass thing in the name of “performance enhancement.” But it's not just ballplayers.  Lots of guys are obsessed with “enhancing” their own “performance,” if you know what I mean.  The most obsessed are those who perform the least. They attribute their lack of performance opportunities to a lack of “enhancement.” Guys who get trapped in this frame of mind might try any crazy ass enhancement scheme, too. So suppose Mordecai Brown had another nickname derived from some other freakish feature that made him perform better than the rest in another arena—something like Mordecai “Hung Like a Horse” Brown. And suppose, according to the legend, he became so enhanced as a result of mangling his right hand. Cripple envy would be rampant. It would be commonplace to see guys without index fingers, wild-eyed with rejection, out chasing rabbits.

I like to tell myself that I’m more evolved than those guys because I refuse to let others define my manhood. But I don’t know. I begin to doubt myself whenever I encounter Lady Grey tea in the grocery store. Lady Grey is kick-ass tea, but I can’t bring myself to buy a whole box off it because, you know, it’s called Lady Grey. I must be worried that the cashier will wonder what enjoying Lady Grey tea so much says about me. I know I should be much more worried about what giving a crap about what a stupid thing like that says about me says about me. But I can still only comfortably buy Lady Grey in the variety box where she’s surrounded by other butch teas like Irish Breakfast. This is much less conspicuous.

Smart Ass Cripple Spreads a Little Sunshine

Sometimes, in my role as a cripple, I am called upon to bring a little sunshine into the lives of those who are not crippled.

I’m happy to do it. I feel as if it’s my duty to brighten up their day. One such opportunity to spread a little sunshine arose not too long ago when I went to the drug store to pick up some condoms. The condoms were beyond my reach so I looked for a store clerk to assist me. I looked around. Whom would I select to have their day brightened? I chose a young woman stocking shelves in the next aisle. I led her to the condom rack. I pointed out the pack of condoms I wanted and she took it down off the hook, all while maintaining her professional poker face. But I knew that deep down inside she couldn’t wait to go home so she could tell whomever she goes home to, “Guess what! Today I helped a crippled guy buy condoms!”

So now I look forward to buying condoms for more reasons than one. Next time I think I’ll really give some lucky clerk an exciting story to tell by selecting the extra-jumbo size condoms or something exotic like the mint-flavored French ticklers. Or maybe I’ll buy a dozen condoms and come back the next day and buy a dozen more.

By doing this, I am not just spreading sunshine. I am also spreading cripple awareness. Some cripples say everything a cripple does in public spreads cripple awareness, even buying condoms. We can’t escape it. We are always representing cripples whether we like it or not, so we have to be on our best behavior. But sometimes I feel I can best spread true cripple awareness by acting like an ass hole. I do this not on behalf of myself but on behalf of those of my crippled brethren who happen to be ass holes. Their rights are often overlooked.

But true freedom for cripples will only be achieved when crippled ass holes have the same rights as ass holes that can walk and talk and see and hear. This doesn’t only apply to cripples. Take gay marriage, for example. The gay people who speak up in public and file lawsuits for the right to marry seem to always be in devoted, long term, supportive, committed relationships. But why can’t any of them be ass holes? I mean, ass holes of every shape and size that are heterosexual have the right to get married, right? They don’t have to reassure everyone that they are wholesome and upstanding before they can get a license. So why should gay people have to do it?

It’s like when the ACLU stands up for free speech for the Nazis. Free speech means free speech, even for the ass holes. So it goes when you let all the cripples in. It’s a guarantee, as with every other population, that you will let some ass holes in, too. It’s good to remind everybody of that every now and then. And I’m the perfect guy to do it.

The Federal Definition of a Broke Ass Cripple

I just read something pretty hilarious. It’s called "Supplemental Security Income Modernization Project: Final Report of the Experts." 

It has 21 authors. They were the “experts” assembled by the Commissioner of the Social Security Administration to make recommendations on how to “modernize” the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program.

SSI is the primary means of income for about 7 million broke ass American cripples. And I do mean broke ass. The average monthly SSI payment is $519.

And like I said, the report is quite a laugh riot in spots. But if I were you, I wouldn’t run out and buy a copy. You should just wait until "Supplemental Security Income Modernization Project: Final Report of the Experts" is adapted into a blockbuster movie. Because you have to machete your way through acres of tedium in order to find the best comic gems.  For example, there’s a big belly laugh in chapter III, which has the whacky title of “Needs-Based Issues-- Including the Elimination of In-Kind Support and Maintenance and Raising the Resources Limits While Streamlining the Exclusions.” The following uproarious phrase is found on page 70:  “A majority of the experts supported increasing the resources limits to $7,000 for an individual and $10,500 for a couple…”

I almost peed my pants when I read that! Because this report came out in 1992, when the SSI resource limit was $2,000 for an individual and $3,000 for a couple. That meant that was pretty much all the money someone getting SSI could have to their name without getting kicked off the program. Guess what the resource limit is today. If you guessed that it’s still $2,000 for an individual and $3,000 for a couple, you win our grand prize!

So not only do SSI cripples have to be broke ass, they have to be broke ass in 1992 dollars! And here’s an even funnier line from the report: “All of the 19 experts who expressed a view… support an increase in the current $30 payment limit applicable to certain residents of medical institutions.” Those “certain residents of medical institutions” are SSI cripples who live in places like nursing homes. They are the broke assiest of broke ass cripples. In 1992, they were only allowed to keep $30 a month from their SSI checks. The rest was turned over to the nursing home.  So guess how much “certain residents of medical institutions” get to keep today. While you think about it I’ll go pour myself another shot. Okay I’m back. And the answer is------------ (drum roll)------------------ $30 a month!

Here’s one more knee-slapper from the report’s cover letter, written by Arthur Flemming, the leader of the panel of experts and former Secretary of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare.  Flemming acknowledged that “modernizing” SSI costs money. “We are, however, the richest nation in the world,” he wrote. He then cited a Congressional Budget Office study that said the after-tax income of the upper one percent of Americans increased by 70 per cent between 1977 and 1989 while the income of lower 20 per cent declined nine percent. Flemming wrote, “I believe that it is only fair to ask the upper one percent to share a small portion of their wealth with the poor.”

Isn’t that priceless? How preciously naïve!

Nothing has changed because the broke ass aren’t a lobbying force. Oh there are noble liberals who lobby on behalf of the broke ass. But it’s not the same. The broke ass need to speak for themselves. A name like Broke Ass Disabled Activists on Social Security makes for a good acronym (BADASS). But I hate to use that “d” word—disabled. It’s much too polite. Cripple has so much more punch. And besides, cripples aren’t the only ones who are broke ass. You don’t have to be crippled to be broke ass, but it sure gives you a good head start.

A more inclusive and thus powerful lobbying force would be something like the National Association of the Broke Ass. Some cripples like to point out that everyone should care about what happens to the cripples because anyone can become crippled at any moment. The same can be said of the broke ass.

It wouldn’t take much for the organized broke ass to shake things up. All they have to do is show up where politicians hang out.  There’s nothing politicians fear more than being confronted by hoards of the broke ass.  They'll take swift action. They’ll demand that the Department of Homeland Security build an alligator-infested moat around Capitol Hill.

Chasing politicians is fun and its good exercise. It beats sitting around waiting to be modernized.