A New Word: Devotee

It's been awhile since I have written and I don't know why. There have been many things to write about, however maybe I just needed a little time to find a topic that would initiate my writing. So here goes, it seems like its been forever.

Awhile ago I added someone on facebook who I originally thought was a co-student of mine, however while the names were the same, this individual was not that student, yet someone who would stir up a lot of ideas and emotions.

While I was checking my inbox and just toodling around on facebook one day the little instant chat message box popped up with his name as the title and the first comment reading: "Are you in a wheelchair?" My first emotional reaction was insult, how does a person not even say 'Hello, How are you?', he jumped to something so personal right away. So I exited he message box and kept meandering around the facebook sight. Until the exact same message popped up ten minutes later, when I proceeded to log off completely in anger and humiliation.

I realized later on how immature I was being, yes he was asking something personal about my lifestyle, but it is apart of who I am right now. I realized it made me angry because it forced me to face the fact that at this moment in time I am running my life on wheels and not my two feet. It meant facing the fact that I did fit the definition of disabled, which for me was humiliating. Then the gates to guilt broke, and the river of guilt gushed in. How could I be insulted, angered and humiliated, especially when I had a sister who was disabled? I love her, I owe her so much, So how is it that I loved, accepted and defended(even though she didn't need to be) her so easily? And I can't do the same for myself? I know my sister could have cared less about being accepted and defended and playing a part in being the definition of disabled. She was just herself and that was all that mattered. For myself it's just so much more complicated, accepting myself now is difficult, because I was just beginning to know and love the person I was before the accident. The process of being me for me was interupted and starting all over again is like grinding big boulders into dust.

Anyways, about a week and a half later the same message pops up, and this time I decide to chat back a forth. I told the gentlemen I found it insulting that he didn't even say hello first, and he apologized, so that was nice. Then because I didn't know how I knew him I asked him, and he replied saying "We haven't ever met, but do you know what the word devotee means?", I replied saying "No," and he further explained. The word Devotee describes a individual who is attracted to people in wheelchairs. So this freaked me out, yet I continued the conversation, asking if he was turned off by walking women, how long he'd known about the wheelchair world, and how he had come to know he was one of these individuals. He was so casual about the whole thing, like it was nothing to talk about it, he seemed like a weirdo, to like girls in wheelchairs, how awful.

Then once again the gates of guilt opened again, how could I have such hopeless degrading thoughts. Especially when I saw my sister as beautiful and wished and hoped for he to find somebody exactly like this man. She deserved to be happy with a man who loved her more than life itself. How could it be that in such a short time, my thoughts and ides on loving people in wheelchairs had become completely reversed?

As we tied up the conversation I told the gentlemen "it's nice to know that there are people like yourself out there", he replied " I am glad that you think that way." It was nice to end the conversation that way, it was a conversation I needed to have. I haven't chatted with him since, but maybe once was all I needed, to expand the Mel Mind.