Poker Face

What I'm about to say is hard. I should preface it with this: I'm not trying to have a pity party today, but sometimes, life isn't worth a lot without those days  where you lay your cards on the table face up and keep it real. 

Sometimes I don't like being me. 

And not because I'm blonde or have a Sourhern accent or don't drive. 

Not because I hate how I put off laundry day or leave the milk out at least once a week in my sleepy stupor. 

Not even because I can take things personally when people don't mean them to be personal or because I can have an awkward sense of humor at inappropriate times. 

But for the obvious reason. 

Sometimes I do not like having a disability. At all. Sometimes I hate it. 

Yes, hate. 

You know how "they" say there's a thin line between love and hate?

Well, the commonality between love and hate is that they both require you to care. To love something you have to care about it. And to hate something, you have to care enough to invest energy to fuel your disdain. 

Most of the time I love being me. I embrace who I am, because my disability has given me so much: a passion for civil rights work, an amazing,  eclectic group of friends, and a faith in God that is renewed each time I wake another day. 

I appreciate my body, made in His image. 

I appreciate my work borne from my own life. 

I appreciate the people I know who can truly love me completely-- who let me breathe out, laugh at myself, and who I honestly know would walk three miles with me without one look of pity or request that I pick up the pace. 

But even with all the joy it brings me, it gets old. 

The looks of pity from random strangers on the street. 

Walking past a window and seeing myself in the reflection, realizing why they give me that look. 

Explaining at least once a week that no, my life is not "hard" or "difficult" or "heroic "... It is my life. The only one I've ever had and ever known. 

Going into a shoe store, seeing women my age with fantastic, sexy, colorful shoes, and hearing them talk about the hundreds of dollars of shoes they have in their closet. 

I think, "I have hundreds of dollars in my closet too... Only I get excited when I can find something that doesn't look like it should have come from an orthopedic store or wear out after one 10-hour wear."

Sometimes I am angry. Sometimes, I don't want to take 10 minutes just to put on my shoes in the morning. 

Sometimes, I want to walk into a dance studio and sign up for a hip hop class without the word "adaptive" in front of it. 

Sometimes, when I lie alone at night, I wonder what's really holding me back from finding love. 

Let's see--there was the guy who broke up with me because I reminded him of his grandma. 

The guy who broke up with me because he thought being with me made him seem he had more of a disability. 

Or the most recent guy who could never give me a reason on the whole... and while I know in my head disability probably had little to do with his lack of commitment.... it fits the pattern and seems like a fairly easy scapegoat at the moment. 

Honestly, I liked getting my heart broken by a gay man the best because 1. I knew even walking away that he loved me. and 2. I knew our breakup had nothing to do with the two metal sticks I carry. 

But I digress...

I have to sell myself every day. We all do. At work. In our dating lives.  With every new person we meet. 

But today-- I'm tired of selling. 

So, here you go. Here I am. 

I have a disability. It's here. It's not going anywhere. Every morning when I wake up it will be there. And that will be the case the entirety of my Earthly life. And sometimes I hate that--yes. 

But what I hate more is how others see it. I abhor this constant expectation and assumption that everything I have ever achieved in my life  has been in spite of my disability. 

 

No. No. No. No. 

This attitude. This " overcoming" piece of bull (excuse my French) is exactly what I hate. 

I didn't graduate high school in the top of my class in spite of my disability. I graduated at the top of my class because I worked harder than most of the people at the bottom. 

Why did I work harder? Because I have a disability .... And I have to sell myself. Because that lady who pities me on the street expects less of me than I do, and maybe, sometimes, so do you. 

This is the same reason I have three law licenses and 2 graduate degrees and speak 2 languages. The same reason I jump out of planes and run races and row boats. 

The same reason that I have loved and been loved and that I know I will ultimately find the love of my life. 

Because I live. I live hard, fast, deliberately, and with purpose. I live with a disability. A part of me that pushes me to achieve from my core. My disability is not an obstacle in my path. It is a catalyst to my success. My disability forces me to focus on who I am, and what I can do, and how I can get to where He wants me to be. While society might harp on what I can do in spite of it, I am constantly thinking of what He will allow me to achieve because of it. 

Because I know that where I am weak, God sees me as strong. The life I've been given was given to me for a purpose, and for this reason, I could never "hate" it for long. My life is a gift, exactly as I'm living it. Right now. Today. 

Even on bad days. 

Sure, I may wake up some days and hate my armbraces,  my feet, my accent, my hair, whatever. 

But i know that I am not less. None of those things make me less.  I am more. I don't do anything in spite of my disability. Everything I do is because of it. It's part of who I am-- who He's made me. (We all know God don't make junk). In my disability He's given me another source for drive, another motivation to serve, and another reason to live just a little harder, faster, stronger-- seeking His joy and ways to share it while on Earth. 

But if He's let living with my disability teach me anything, it's that this life is not about living happily ever after. 

The point is that we live. 

A blow to the ego....

I remember sitting in my parents' dining room at Christmas, defending myself. I explained that I knew I loved this person that I'd seen twice, and talked to since April, because "he just gets me."  

I knew I sounded crazy, for lack of a better term, and I was "crazy" in love.

I've not had many great loves in my life.... but I've been blessed to have some... and I would consider this person one of them.  From the moment we met, we both agreed  that it was as though we had known each other forever.... almost since the beginning of time.  The first time we met, we compared it to the Barenaked Ladies song, "It's All Been Done," because the whole weekend felt like an intense series of deja vu experiences, one right after the other. See the video below if you have no idea what I'm referencing.... though clearly BNL weren't singing about people, but about the nine lives of a cat.

But I digress.....

I'm sure everyone who reads this blog knows how I felt, and that I don't fall often, but that when I do fall, it is fast and hard.  My dad knows this too; we are very similar in the way we deal with our emotions, and he has always taught me to see the good in people.  We both see the good, sometimes to a fault.

"Sissy," he said.  "Just don't be too hungry.  I just don't want you to get hurt."  I knew what he meant; he wanted me to lower my expectations about this relationship and this person, not to be so insistent that things work out if it turned out that they clearly weren't working.  

But at the time, I thought to myself , "I won't let it get to that point.  I'm not desperate."

And then, it happened.  The man in question and I were having what I'll term a "lively discussion" concerning an e-mail that I had sent, imploring him (I suppose I could even use the word begging here) not to run again.  He had just come back into my life after another absence, and I had this feeling (call it woman's intuition) that he was about to bolt again.  I loved him, and I didn't want to lose his companionship, so I was asking him to just hang with me... to give it a real chance....

And you know what he said?  He said I sounded desperate.

And you know what else?       He was right.

I was.  I wanted to feel from this person, just once, that he felt the same love for me as I did for him.

I wanted to feel for 5 seconds like I could be sure he wasn't going to up and leave the next time a pretty girl walks by or he meets someone kinda cool on plentyoffish or okcupid.  

He had been using me like a revolving door, going into and out of my life on a whim here and there, chasing whichever girls looked more desirable to him at the moment.  Sometimes these quick comings-and-goings would involve rash actions.  Sometimes, he would completely blindside me with his affections for another person, but every time, I could sense a change in him beforehand.  I could never quite articulate what was about to happen... but I knew "the winds of change were blowin' wild and free..."  

And then, on the heels of another wind,  he would come back, and say that he loved me... and for whatever reason, I'd believe him.  

We repeated this cycle over and over.  Why would he lie, I thought?  Love is a choice.  He doesn't have to love me, but he is choosing to do so.  

No.  He was choosing to love himself.  It was never about me, always about him.  We'd be fine for awhile.  He'd leave for some other woman.  He'd come back after it didn't work, and he'd always say that he didn't want a relationship because:

1.  he needed to focus on him.

2. he didn't want to jump in.

3. he'd been hurt before and didn't want to repeat the past.    

Ok, fine.  But can you really say that you love someone, and then in the same breath say that you promise them... absolutely nothing?

Not next week?  Not tomorrow?  Not even the rest of the day, if you don't feel like it?

What is love if if it doesn't involve at least a short-term unspoken commitment?

Well, I can tell you what it's not.

It's actually not love.  Lust, maybe.  Dependency, maybe.  Boredom, maybe.  But not love.

And just like that, my "not love" vanished in the middle of a text conversation about juvenile delinquency last Thursday... 

Am I surprised? No, I could sense it was about to happen.

Besides, it's all been done before.

Big love....

As a single woman in her thirties, I'm finding that my generation and those younger than us have been taught to expect big love. 

From movies. 

From the media. 

From our peers. 

Any little girl who loves fairy tales has at least once longed for the Cinderella gesture.  That Prince Charming who would travel the length of his entire kingdom just to return her shoe and offer her his heart. 

That man who would chase her through an airport. 

Who would plan an elaborate surprise and invite all of her friends and family. 

Who would build her a closet for her shoes in a million dollar Manhattan apartment. 

We all want big love. 

If you're going to do it, do it big, right?

I've had big love in my life. 

The man who got down on both knees in the middle of my kitchen to propose to me. 

The man who chased me through Union Station at midnight, because I wasn't returning his calls, and he just had to tell me that he didn't want to lose me. 

The man who drove 6 hours one Saturday just to spend 3 with me--doing absolutely nothing-- all because he knew I needed him there. 

Big love. 

All of those big, sweeping gestures that I'm to believe signify forever love (or at least the long-lasting type)... and...

Well, I'm not married. I've long since left Union Station and stopped returning the calls.  I do still talk to that 6 hour marathon driver.... But it's...complicated. 

The big love never really worked for me. 

To me, big love is in the little things. 

Asking how my day went everyday and genuinely caring to know. 

Making my coffee without my instruction, because you pay attention to how I like it. 

Walking my dog for me on a rainy day. 

Knowing that when I say I've had a bad day that it means I need take out Chinese, Nesquik, Hot Tamales, and an Audrey Hepburn, Carey Grant, or sometimes even Hugh Grant marathon. 

The proof in love--what makes it rise to a level that can weather any storm two people create--is found not in the big romantic gesture, but in how they show their love on a random Tursday when nothing's gone right and they've barely spoken a word. 

To me, big love is when you hold the door open, help me with my coat, and share your umbrella even when you're angry. 

Big love is caring enough to remember my friends' names, the book I'm reading, or what I'm working on in the office. 

Big love is making an effort to be my best friend, ask my opinion, lend me yours, and communicate with me not out of habit... But because when you think about me, it often makes you smile. 

My Prince Charming doesn't have to chase me through a kingdom to prove his love; he simply has to show me that he's worth mine by treating me with kindness, respect, genuine interest, and thoughtful, tender care. 

Love is in the air....

Ah, Spring... the time when a man's fancy turns to love.  

The time of year when new bonds form, and old bonds take new shape.

The time of year when the cute dresses in my closet are in heavy rotation for engagement parties, and weddings, and first-meetings of friends' new loves.

Everyone seems to take an interest in my relationship status.

The convenience store clerk.

The bus driver.

The random person on the street.  Shaking my hand and holding it a few seconds longer than usual to glance down at my left hand and find:

some nails in need of a manicure and a very pretty diamond once the symbol of a great love (my parents').  My ring finger, however, is of course bare.  

"You'll find someone," a complete stranger assures me.  "When you're not looking, he'll be there."  

Well, trust me, I'm not looking... and there are a few men vying for my affections.  But you know what they say-- when you know, you know.  And I think I know....

that right now is just not the right time.  

That my time will come with someone who loves, appreciates, and cherishes me for all that I am.

I don't say this with trepidation or hesitation, or in order to convince myself.

I say it because I know it to be true.

Last month, I was called to testify at my agency's annual performance hearing in front of Councilmember Jim Graham.  Our office had spent weeks before the testimony preparing 40 pages of compiled information about our past year's accomplishments to be able to field any question he might ask.  But when we came to the table, Councilmember Graham seemed to only want to talk about one thing: marriage.  

Prior to our testimony, a member of the public and a well-known member of the disability community, Ricardo, had offered testimony on our behalf.  As part of his testimony, Ricardo told his story.  He had lived at the infamous Forest Haven institution for as long as he could remember, and was there until it was closed down in 1994 due to conditions that violated the residents' civil rights. To see Forest Haven today, watch the video below.  

When Ricardo left Forest Haven, he was told that he'd struggle, that he wouldn't find a job, or have a family, or live on his own.  Though his journey has taken years, Ricardo has proven all of the naysayers wrong.  He owns a home, is very active in the community and disability rights movement, and he and his wife (who met at Forest Haven) are now enjoying their first granddaughter. 

Upon hearing Ricardo's story, Councilmember Graham was moved, so when my co-worker Mat and I approached the table with our boss, he asked us about our marital status.  I suppose it's relevant to say here that Mat is also a person with CP and walks with armbraces, so we both have visible disabilities.  Mat is marrying his girlfriend Melissa this summer, so the Councilmember spent some time congratulating him.... 

And then he came to me....

"Are you married, young lady?" he asked in front of the estimated 10 people watching DC public access television that day.

"No, sir... but I'm working on it."

"Can you believe, ladies and gentlemen, that at one time, people such as this intelligent and attractive young lady here weren't allowed to marry?"

I kept expecting a door to open behind him revealing a panel of men, a la "The Dating Game..." but alas, all I got that day was a free personal ad broadcast on what is probably the least watched cable channel this side of the NASA live-feed channel.

The point he made though is an important one.  I don't think most people outside the disability rights movement realize that until the 1970's voluntary (and involuntary) sterilization was a common practice in the disability community.  Some states still have sterilization laws on the books.  There is an attitude that is sadly somewhat persistent,  encouraging the belief that people with disabilities shouldn't have families, or that if we do have children, their lives will be miserable and burdensome, both to the children as they age, and to the state who will supposedly have to provide for them.

Now, the rights of parents with disabilities really deserve another post, so I won't broach the subject any further.  What I will say is that I see evidence of this attitude everyday in my own life.  

When people tell me I shouldn't have kids because it will "be too hard."

When a well meaning person sees a nice guy with CP and says, "Oh, he'd be perfect for you."

Why?  I don't even know him... us both being ceeps just means that we have one common physical characteristic.

One.

Maybe two, if he's a preemie.

Making an assumption about what I can and cannot accomplish or about who I should or should not be with based on my outside appearance is.... well.... shallow.

Believe it or not, it may not be as harsh, but it is in the same line of thinking as the assumptions the Forest Haven officials and staff made about Ricardo when he left the institution... and he defied them all.

How?  Through love.  With the right supports and the right partner, Ricardo accomplished goals that society for years had declared impossible for him.

And he thrived.

Ricardo's story is proof that love is all you need.  Because with love comes determination, and perseverance, and ingenuity.  Love is the driving force that pushes us through adversity.  It gives us strength when we are weak, hope when we are lost, and a smile through the tears.

Realistically, love may not sustain you on its own, but if you let it grow, it has the potential to be the sole catalyst to achieving all you dream.

  

Forgiveness is paying the rent...

This calendar year, I am making a concerted effort to read more books written from the perspective of young, Christian women, especially women approaching thirty or in their thirties who happen to be single. There doesn't seem to be a lot for us, and what does exist seems to focus on preparing to be a godly wife. 

I'm not saying that preparing to assume the role of godly wife isn't something I should pursue. It absolutely is.  I've always felt called to be someone's wife, and in God's time, I want to make sure that I can become a loving, thoughtful, encouraging, edifying helpmeet to the one He will entrust me to.  

But the fact is, right now, I'm not married-- not in the Earthly sense anyway.  Right now, I need to focus on my marriage to God bestowed on me through Jesus and His gift of forgiveness.  I need to continue to immerse myself in Him, to appreciate the freedom that I have to spend hours alone with His Word, seeking out new truths and shoring up old ones.  I need to see the opportunities I have in life to serve, to show Him to others, to talk with them about Him, and to demonstrate His love in even the tiniest of ways.  

At the beginning of the year, I'll admit, my marriage to God wasn't doing so well.  We hit a rough patch, God and me.  I was angry at Him for the failings of my Earthly relationship with a man I cared very deeply about.

When I was in prayer, I asked Him over and over, "Why would You let him into my life just to take him out again?"

"God, why aren't You helping me? Why aren't You showing me what I'm doing wrong?"

"I'm trying to root myself in Your Love.  Why isn't that enough for him?  Why aren't You letting it be enough?"

As I think about the countless conversations we had, I was asking all of these questions, poring over the Bible, and somehow still finding myself without answers.

And I was blaming the deafening silence in my heart all on God.

Well, just like Alison Kraus, sometimes God says it best when He says nothing at all.

His answer: It's not Me.

Whenever we look at our Earthly problems and start to blame them on God, that's when things can take a turn for the worse.

God never lets things just "happen" to you or me, we always have some hand in our fate.  Free will is that hand.

I had made the decision to invite this person into my life, to make a lot of the issues we'd faced together public, and then to back away from our friendship after suffering a broken heart.

That was all me.  I made all of those human decisions.  Not God.

Yes, He placed a man in my path. Someone I know He expected me to love.  Someone I know He expected me to learn from.  Someone I know He expected me to help, and to receive help from... but ultimately His bringing our paths together was the only perfect part of the scenario; we took what He gave us, and we screwed it up without any help from Him.

Both of us at times had acted toward each other without first praying about it, without first seeking His guidance, without first asking what He would have us do.

He hadn't let us fall apart; we had pushed Him out of our relationship with the weight of our own selfish desires... and our growing apart was a result of that distance from Him.

Recently, and for the last time, that person has re-entered my life.  I say "for the last time," because this time, I know he isn't leaving again. Call it intuition, call it foresight, call it overconfidence, but I know it to be so.  And I'm sure there are a few people who will have an opinion about whether he should have a place in my life after the events of the last 6 months.

Personally, I don't care what anyone thinks.  For what you think and your skewed opinions, I'm to blame.  Why?  Because all the time that I was crying and complaining and telling of how deeply I'd been wronged... I was bound up in human emotion.  I was not acting toward him, or even toward myself in a godly manner.

We've both done and said things that we should not have done or said.

We've both taken actions that were not rooted in God's love.

We've both ignored His guidance at times to follow our own ideas of what we should do.

And for that, we both require forgiveness.  

So I'm choosing to forgive.
   
Because I honestly love this person--as a person and as a soul-- he was crafted by God into existence.   Yes, he has hurt me.  I know I have hurt him.  I'm not forgetting those moments-- being human I can't.  But I am choosing to walk by example, and to forgive as Christ forgave (Ephesians 4:32).

Think about that; we are to forgive as Christ forgave.

Christ forgave the sins of the people who killed Him-- who beat Him, mocked Him, and hung Him on a cross to die.  Yet somehow I'm choosing to completely cut a person out of my life, because of a few careless decisions he made when he wasn't sure how to communicate with me?

Ummmm... No.

Is choosing to cut a person off for something that minor really in line with the love we are called to give to one another?

Christ forgave us AND he paid the debt for all of OUR transgressions, while he was a sinless, blameless lamb.

We, however, choose time and time again not to forgive others their transgressions, even in situations where we too bear some blame.

We hold a grudge, and let an Earthly situation weigh on our hearts so heavily that it makes us unhappy, affects other relationships, or even affects how we look at ourselves.

Forgiveness makes light that burden; it creates a fresh start.  It forges a new bond.  It keeps that person in our lives, yes, but it allows them a chance to atone for their transgression through action and sincere apology.

Forgiveness isn't about continually coming back to the same situation and letting the same sins rear their heads repeatedly.  It's about two people actually working together to right the wrong(s) that were done.  One by asking for forgiveness, the other by offering it... and the both of them by working together in love to forge a new path unmarred by those past wrongs.   

Good enough...

I am good enough to be yours.

In the dark, on a train, miles away from anyone whose eyes know.

In a whispered tone in the dead of night while the world sleeps and the only sounds are our dripping declarations of love.

In your times of deepest need.  In your times of driest boredom.  In your times of darkest loneliness.

I am always good enough.

I am good enough to be yours.

In the light, in a crowd of people we know, surrounded by familiar laughter.

In a loud yell from the city rooftops when the echoes of our voices blend into the dissonance of car horns, and sirens, and the birth of more new buildings.

In your times of utter joy.  In your hours of praise.  When a blanket of happiness covers you.

I am always good enough.