Re: misunderstandings/intentions/thoughts

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: : : I have no desire to silence anyone. All are free to express and share their experience. My purpose has been to express and share my experience. What is resonant to me is the spirit of the movie, available on video, of a young woman missing both arms who says: "I'm Not Broken, Don't Try to Fix Me". It is also the title of the film. : : : Black people, all people of color, do not want to be white. Their race is not something that can be changed. For too long, the dominant culture of this society viewed people of color more favorably if the POC acted like a white person. Blacks, Hispanics, East Indians as well as Native Americans are all proud of who they are. : : : So too are many paras and quads that I know. A paraplegic or a quadriplegic cannot "pass" as able bodied, "AB's" for short. Amputees often, I have experienced, try to "pass" as AB's. My experience informs me that many try to not be associated with those who are paralyzed or otherwise "different". I have been paralyzed. I know the feeling of being pitied. I also know the pride that runs through people who live their lives on wheels. : : : My amputations are quite apparent. Prostheses or no, I do not hide what I am. I embrace my identity; it is mine for the rest of my life. Even if the compression of my spinalcord in my neck leads to quadriplegia, I will remain an amputee. But what makes me disabled is the same thing that disabled a whole race in this country. What I hope to awaken is some understanding, a sense, of what happened to all of us, in that split second when we crossed a line. : : : One can pretend that one is "normal"; pass like a "high yellow" black brother or sister might have done in the past. Or one can embrace one's whole self and know that is is worth loving. As I said, I love my life. I have seen and experienced things and been places I never would have had I not become what I am. : : : I look in the mirror every morning. I like the person I see in that mirror; I love her and she always smiles back. : : : Karen : : You can try and spin it, but it still come back to you. : : No one saying you shouldn’t embrace your identity : : Just don’t force it on someone else. : : Ethnicity in this world I wouldn’t touch that with a ten foot pole. : : It would be easier to recast your vote in Florida : : Than to try and change people in society as they view me or you : : Movies and books are quite phony, and are used primarily : : To inspire and escape from ones reality. : : I use them as well, but I can discern the difference between : : The ugly truth and a beautiful lie : : I don’t have a problem with that, as I am handy cap person : : Sometimes I need to escape from this reality and then return back : : It’s just in the process I try not to offend people, if I have please except my apology : : We all must do what ever it takes to keep our sanity : : I don’t feel good a bought this exchange between the two of us : : But I could not keep this inside : : Karen I wish you the best in all : : Sincerity : : Your Friend Ernie :) : Dear Ernie: : I do not live in a world of fiction. The reality of the world is not lost on me. I believe strongly that our happyness is our, individual, business. We are ill served when we depend upon another person or the society we live in for our happyness. : Many marrages fail because one or both spouses have entered the marrage with the expectation that the other will "make them happy". That is too much to ask of any person. Yet, when one spouse fails in the task, divorce happens. : No matter what my complement of limbs is, I can choose to be happy. Or, I can choose to be miserable. If I constantly measure my life against my life "before" I am presenting myself with a comparison I cannot ever come out on top. If living AS IF I were not an amputee is my approximation of ideal, I am doomed to failure. To be as active and involved with life as I can be becomes my goal, then every day can be a success. : I suppose there are many who live unexamined lives. Yet, there the philosophier's words ring true; "the unexamined life is not worth living". That lays behind the editorial comment printed in "New Mobility" magazine that was as follows: "there are perfectly good disabilities being handed out to peopel who do not appreciate them". : All I want to do is raise the percent of those disabled folks who do appreciate their disability. : Karen

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