Who I am, not WHAT I am.

Yes okay we had yesterday and that is where things are, where my life is, my body, and things probably won’t be getting better. But…..that is not ALL that I am.

Today, things went not so good. My GP observed me yesterday and then said that I could have heroin for pain if I wanted (or the synthetic heroin), when he told me that even using the strongest opiates, 75% of pain limitation is all we might manage. Today, he called the Neuro people to confirm and was told that what I feeling (in my spine? In my muscles, in my leg bones?) was carpal tunnel pain and I needed to wear a wrist brace. Now, my GP has decided to forgo his OWN observations of my pain, and instead cancel all new pain treatment (again). We think the Neuro people (like Dr. Mezei who never actually examined my carpal nerve, or pushed my wrist) might be smoking that wacky tobaccy.

So, yeah, pain in the ass, pain everywhere actually. But you know what, that is just WHERE I AM, that is not WHO I AM.

I have a choice, I can be imprisoned by my circumstances, or I can become something else.

I can rise.

Tonight I went to badminton. Both of the badminton coordinators were there, playing each other in a doubles game. I told Linda to go to the other end of the gym and sat in the one open court and waited. Three people came, they got out their gear, they looked at me and they went over to the other courts, invited Linda into a game of doubles. And I waited, in my wheelchair. Thirty-five minutes passed. I was finally told that I “could” be part of a game, one of the badminton coordinators was on the opposite side with another top player. We did not warm up. The score was 15-0. I never even served. I went back to sitting in the empty court. Another person came in and the same three people started warming up for 10 minutes with him. I wheeled to a regular, maybe a coordinator and asked, “Why are they warming up?” They told me the person who had just joined hadn’t played yet so they were warming up for them. Oh. I went back to my court and waited. Three more people had come. They finally decided to use the court I was on. Linda had already played two games of doubles. These are the same directors who, when Cheryl and I come in wheelchair will not integrate us with other players….ever.

I have a choice, I can accept the circumstances, or I can say while warming up next to the doubles game the two coordinators were playing loudly that “You know, this is “recreational badminton” not “ablist badminton” and that the policy of the Y is “the full participation of ALL members of society.”"

I was told by my warm up partner that “well, sometimes better players like to drive off the weaker players so they can play more competitively.”

I said, “Well, that actually is why we have federal laws about what constitutes a human right, and what they are doing is no different than doing it based on skin color. And if you don’t believe that I WILL go downstairs and make that complaint, why don’t you ask the fencing club?” (they don’t exist at the Y anymore)

So tomorrow I am going to the YMCA and making a complaint to the director of athletics. And tomorrow I am writing at least THREE postcards and sending them out. Because either I let others or my body dictate WHO I am, and how I live, or I rise. I rise so that the next person who comes with any physical limitation is treated with the respect they should be, if only because the coordinators have the FEAR OF ELIZABETH in them.

I am dying. I am not dead.

I am not a person who can do much, at times, it is all I can do to breathe, but there is so much to do. I cannot stop what I wish I could: the acts of violence, of rape, of degradation we practice against each other.

I can send out a post card with something maybe a bit witty to try and give someone ONE MINUTE of a smile in that day, or in that week where there were no smiles at all. This I can do. It is a choice.

I will not be bound. I will rise. It is better knowing what I face and fighting anyway.

(As a side note, I am having real difficulty getting anime postcards, if anyone knows where I can get ones of pretty girls (with clothes), nice boy/boy couples, or girl/girl couples or girls having fun, please let me know. I need “ammo” in my post card campaign.).