Back when I was in my twenties and dating but unmarried, my girlfriend and I would go into Cambridge on occasion to watch and hear performers at Passim, a small coffee house just around the corner from the Harvard coup. One particular performer’s song stands out given my current circumstances, It was a song about being handicapped.
Like most all of his songs it had more than a little wit about it. I particularly like the line “Temporarily Able Bodied” because that’s my current situation. Who knows, maybe I’ll grow out of it. So I went through the standard steps of getting a placard and such and honestly felt a bit like a fraud because I could make my way along ok most of the time. Except for the falls. Except for the snow covered parking lot. Except for the black ice which seemed to have multiplied over night.
When the fire alarm rang in my apartment building I really for the first time realized that getting out of the building would be hard but I thought possible with my cane. So I took a few steps down the fire stairs and then, well, I fell, fortunately back and not forward. I was suddenly very nervous. I was blocking the stairs, nervous and more than a little shaky. I tried to get back on my feet.
As I tried to rise a few people from the apartment building lifted me up and carried me out of the building. The alarm was soon off having been the typical stupid people can’t read a warning sign about not smoking in the building.
These people were kind and attentive and made sure I was ok. No mad rush, just orderly proceeding landing all of us out the door.
God bless those kind people and those like them who are in this life for more than their own self interest.
My Gifted Life 