Dear Wheelchair: We Need to Talk

Dear Wheelchair:

We need to talk. Yes, I know: no conversation in history starting off that way ever ended well. But there are some things we need to hash out.

We’ve been together nearly half a decade. Wow, that’s significant. Five years is the length of cohabitation most health insurance policies require before a chair user can get a new chair. Not that I’m in the market for another, dear. I’m just sayin’…

Now, babe, don’t cry. Need some reassurance? You are amazing at giving me my own space. I mean, you are the opposite of clingy. Of course, I would expect nothing less from someone named Torque Storm. Not exactly the moniker of a clinging vine.

But sometimes you’re just a little too laissez–faire. I’ve got an image to uphold, you know. People see a gimp girl in a wheelchair and they immediately assume I’m “wheelchair bound.” (Stop snickering. The B&D of our private life is nobody’s business.) They’re convinced that we’re perpetually fused together. That I shower in you, sleep in you. That I never transfer out of you into a theater seat. Can you imagine what they’d say if they saw me taking a few steps with my walker? Good God, the fallout that would cause.

This affects your image, too, you know. You and your progenitors have established your reputation as symbols of failure, as prisons on wheels. What would they say if it leaked out that you’re really enablers, huh? Enablers of mobility, of freedom…of independence, even! What if I went to the press and told them the truth: that I never would have gotten an education, made a career or left the dang house without you in my life? Two can play at that game, my friend.

Come on now, baby. I didn’t mean to be cruel. You know you’re the best thing that ever happened to me. So what if you’re not my first, or even my fifth? So what if my chair throughout college cradled my backside like no other? It didn’t mean anything. It was nothing compared to what we have. We’re going to be together forever, just you wait and see.

Or at least until insurance says I can roll you to the curb.

Disabilities, Bad Attitudes and Mental Flights of Fancy

I try to live my life by a few simple maxims:

“Strive for balance in all things.”

“Never eat more than you can lift.”

“The only disability in life is a bad attitude.”

It took me years to see the wisdom in that last one. I mean, severe pain and joint damage of rheumatoid arthritis – my particular challenge – are pretty darn dramatic. Having shoulders, hips and knees severed from me and new ones bolted in have proven to be a bit of a distraction.

But I think I’ve finally seen the light and rehabilitated my attitude.

Now when I go to a new restaurant and all of the tables are high with bar stools, I focus on my attitude. Even though I spend the meal staring into my companions’ knees, I mentally try to levitate. That doesn’t actually allow me to socialize with my friends or even hear much of the conversation, but it cleans out all of the “badness” in my mind.

My rehabilitation also comes in handy when I’m traveling and need to catch a taxi. Whether I attempt a street hail or try to schedule a ride by phone, getting a wheelchair-accessible taxi is next to impossible. But that’s OK. Although my trip then requires numerous buses and is four times longer than a cab ride, I’m zipping along through traffic – only in my mind, of course.

If I stay in a hotel or at a relative’s home and there’s no wheelchair-accessible roll-in shower, no problem. As I take my sponge bath at the sink, I imagine myself under a luxurious rain-style shower head. Ah, the lovely flowing water…

You see, I’ve come to realize that being marginalized from society happens not because humankind continues to build restaurants, malls, theaters, offices, transportation and housing with physical barriers. Oh, no. The problem lies within the mind of each and every person with a disability. Fix the attitude and you’ve fixed the problem.

Excuse me -- must run. I need to adjust my attitude up a flight of stairs now. 

2016 New Year’s Resolutions: Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

I’ve never been a big fan of making New Year’s resolutions. I mean, I fail to live up to a variety of personal goals as it is. Why rub salt in even more wounds?

But the idea of making a fresh start is appealing. It’s imbued with that earnestness I so love in young people who haven’t yet figured out how much life can really suck.

So, here goes:

·       When someone hollers at me: “Slow down, little lady. You’re gonna get a speeding ticket!” I will resist the urge to shout back: “You better stop passing gas – you’re gonna get a farting ticket!”

·       If a complete stranger walks up to me and demands to know intimate details about my disability, I will refrain from asking them: (1) about a history of their STDs, (2) why their eyes are so close together, or (3) how they feel about their momma getting passed around at Sturgis like a day-old deli tray.

·       The next time a God twaddler hands me a religious tract, I will resist the urge to pantomime one of Miley Cyrus’s poses for her Terry Richardson photo shoot. (You saw them -- don’t act so innocent.)

·       I will resist the urge to think very mean thoughts about insurance companies, banks and Donald Trump. (OK, I will at least try.)

·       I will not allow myself to feel depressed when I watch TV network news and all of the commercials are for prescription drugs and “wealth management” services. (I will allow myself to feel old, however.)

·       I will not smash the ramp on my van into the car parked by a moron in the adjoining access aisle. (You know, the cross-hatched area between two handicapped parking spaces where no one is supposed to park.) That is, I will not smash their car more than five times. Per minute.

·       I will not beat myself up when I break any of the above by Jan. 2, 2016.

KYLIE JENNER: GIMP GIRL WANNABE

By now, you’ve probably seen the fruits of the Kylie Jenner photo shoot in the current issue of Interview magazine. The teenage reality TV star is dressed provocatively in leather bondage gear. In some of the shots, even her delicately-curved derriere is exposed.

But with all of the photos we average folks are bombarded with on the Internet – celebrities posing in little more than body paint and glitter, fashion models striding nearly nude down catwalks – Ms. Jenner’s photos are not terribly remarkable. You, dear reader, have probably seen much more revealing stuff on your friends’ Instagram accounts.

So why am I even mentioning this? Well, it seems that Ms. Jenner has revealed something intimate about herself that goes beyond bare skin.

Kylie Jenner is a gimp girl wannabe.  

In two of the shots, Kylie is wearing a black leather strapless onesie and a black leather collar while sitting in a gold-tone manual wheelchair.

Looking at the shots left me flummoxed. You see, I thought Larry Flynt was the only gimp out there rocking a gold chair.

Then I tossed that thought aside. I mean, if anybody else could acquire a golden gimp-mobile, it would be a member of the storied Kardashian-Jenner family.

Next, my eyes went to the expression on Kylie’s face. In one photo, she stares off into space as if she’s perhaps experiencing a petit mal seizure. My cynical side wanted to dismiss this as the typical empty gaze of a high fashion model. You know, that look that says “I am insanely gorgeous and make $10 grand an hour, yet I’m so misunderstood.”

But then I realized that Ms. Jenner is really trying out the look of someone who has a disability. She wants to live it, to feel it.

Kylie’s tired of her incredibly privileged, affluent, non-disabled life. She wants to know what it’s like to have precarious health, to struggle to find employment yet keep her government benefits so she can pay for attendant care. She longs to spend weeks trying to find an accessible apartment she can afford, only to have the landlord tell her that the “no pets” policy means she can’t bring her service dog. She yearns to sit in the rain waiting for a bus, only to find that the one that stops has a broken lift and she has to wait another 20 minutes for the next one.

Kylie Jenner, I pronounce you an honorary gimp girl. Welcome to the club.