8:09 p.m. | 2002-08-27 Relax Dude! It Was Just A Joke. So on my way home from work tonight, I stopped by the feed store to get pet food. (Doesn�t that sound so cool? It sounds like I have horses, pigs and chickens or something. However, I just have a few birds and the feed store has bulk birdseed at good prices.) I put my bulk birdseed and millet sprays in bags and took them up to the register. Here�s how that went. (Oh, and the cashier was a wee lad � somewhere between 15 and 20 years old � I�ll call him WL.) (WL:) (After ringing up my birdseed and millet sprays � I had placed each in their own separate small, plain brown paper bags, as is the custom at the feed store.) Would you like me to fold down this bag (birdseed) and tape it shut? (CI:) Yes, please. (Anything I carry, I�m apt to drop/throw hence this cautionary step.) (WL:) Would you like me to fold over the top of this bag (millet sprays) and tape it also? (CI:) Yes, please. (WL:) Would you like me to fold it down several times? (CI:) No, once is fine. I�m not THAT disabled. (WL:) (Looking horrified and shocked.) I didn�t say you were DISABLED!!! (CI:) No, you didn�t. However, I AM disabled and I have a hard time holding onto things; I tend to drop them. (WL:) Oh, okay. I thought maybe you thought I was implying that you were disabled. (Phew!) And, dropping things only makes you a klutz, not disabled. (CI:) Yeah, I guess you�re right. I�m certainly a klutz! (Thinking, no I actually AM disabled but you really don�t want to know about all that.) (WL:) There you go. (CI:) Thanks. (WL:) You�re welcome. Okay, here�s what I learned. When you have an invisible disease, disabled jokes at your own expense might offend and upset the listener. Oh, and then they�re not funny. At all. It�s odd. I live with my disability everyday so it�s common knowledge to me and to the people who really know me. Otherwise, I appear to be a perfectly normal person who does some damned weird things sometimes. (Like walking funny, tripping over invisible objects, throwing things, dropping things, saying stupid stuff, bumping into furniture, etc.) I not only look normal, I actually look completely healthy. And it made me think of TranceJen who also has an invisible disease yet looks completely normal but does things that appear odd too. Now, for safety�s sake, she has to use a cane when walking about. And that garners some rather odd responses from people. (See this entry for her great discourse on that whole issue.) I was thinking of that as I left the feed store. When you already look perfectly normal and healthy, people don�t know how to respond when you add a fashionable accessory for the disabled, or apparently, when you make a disability joke at your own expense. I can relate. For example, if I went to Disneyland, I would have to rent a wheelchair for my sake and for the sake of others. If I didn�t, I would be unable to continue walking after about 30 minutes and would start having major muscle spasms which would cause me to kick things at random, and major pain that would make me swear like a sailor. I'm quite sure that that would not be the experience old Walt would want me to have. Plus, I think you�re prohibited from swearing at Disneyland. So, I would rent the wheelchair. But then, occasionally, I would have to get up to stretch, I would get out of it to go to the restroom, and I would jump up to throw something away in a handy trash receptacle. That�s when the trouble would start. Now people would start to wonder why I�m being such a lazy ass when I�m perfectly normal and healthy and can walk just fine. (I would be walking just fine too because my legs would be rested.) Then it would appear to be �whiner gear�. (Cue commercial song. Cut to fashion model Trancejen successfully navigating a busy intersection while looking absolutely fabulous, and normal and healthy yet wielding a cane. Fade out with the slogan: Whiner Gear. It�s the latest in fashion for the invisibly disabled.) It�s just like when I was in a car accident earlier this year. I went to the emergency room because I heard something in my very painful arm pop, felt something move and then my arm stopped working altogether. I felt it would be prudent, at that point, to drive my sorry ass to emergency. When all was said and done, my arm was not broken or fractured, just flared up due to the accident. The doctor told me to go home and take the medications already prescribed to me. And to rest my arm. (That, by the way, is not a problem when it doesn�t actually work.) Then, he whipped out the Whiner Gear. A standard, hospital-issue sling. He put it on my arm and told me to keep it there. Uh, sure. As soon as I was in the car, I wrestled that Whiner Gear right off my arm and drove home � one-handed, of course. When I went to work the next day, I wore something with pockets. Then, using my good arm, I grabbed my useless hand and shoved it into my pocket and left it there all day. I choose to believe that I actually was looking rather casual or sporty. And, only those close to me noticed that I was actually using only one arm to do everything. But they know I�m apt to lose use of a random limb here or there and also knew I had been in an accident. The only question from that bunch was: �Do you always eat with your left hand?� My response was: �No, I�m just naturally this good eating with my nondominate hand. Of course I always eat with my left hand. Just how stupid are you? I�ve been working with you and eating lunch with you for years, and we�ve discussed my left-handedness several times before. Geesh, what is wrong with YOU?� His response was: �Oh, I forgot. You don�t look left-handed�. Well, now you know why he asked the question in the first place. So, by the way, I�m left-handed but appear to be right-handed. And, we can talk that way to each other with no offense because we�re a great bunch of people! (To be fair, we all have our days when we say really stupid things.) Anyway, I only wore that sling at home. And on the days that my arm didn�t work, I wore clothes with pockets. Moments like these have taught me to give people the benefit of the doubt when they�re doing something that seems rather odd/inappropriate/stupid to me. Maybe there�s a really valid reason behind it. That�s why I tend not to judge other people (or at least, try not to), because I know I don�t know their whole story. your thoughts? seed flower