(7th Entry) It’s All About Me! Part I

I first visited New York City back in October of 1988. (It’ll become obvious as you read my blog that the mid to late 80’s were a very influential period in my life.) I had several good friends who had moved to NY a few years earlier and I was finally having an opportunity to visit them. I remember my first day in Manhattan. It was getting dark and we were walking through The Village. I remember asking them, “Is this safe?” and being a little apprehensive. By my second day I was riding the subway all over by myself. To this day I love NY! I get treated incredibly well there. I always have. (This is probably another blog at some point in time.)

Much of my time on this trip was spent hopping on the subway, getting off, walking around, drinking coffee, hopping back on the subway, etc. Over the course of a few days I noticed that there were quite a few disabled individuals out panhandling. I began noticing more and more. One day I hopped on the express train on my way to visit MoMA. There were approximately 15 to 20 people in the car. At the other end, as the train pulls out of the station, a man enters from the next car who is obviously disabled. He’s walking with a crutch, holding a can and asking for money. I notice people giving him money. As he begins to get closer to me I begin to get more and more uncomfortable.

I begin thinking all of these thoughts: This guy is going to just use the money to get wasted. Why doesn’t the bum just get a job? Then the most amazing thoughts began to surface: Should I give him money? What will the other people think if I give him money? What will they think if I don’t give him money?

All of a sudden a phrase came into my head, “But for the Grace of God, there go I!” I didn’t have a job. In fact I couldn’t even get a one. I had wasted much of my life not being productive. So who was I to judge, to be judging?

But I was! I felt superior to him and yet inferior to those around. In my head I am condemning him, having absolutely no compassion for who he is or what he might be going through. I’m only worried about how people might be viewing me! What are they going to think of me?

What was it about this person that brought out such emotions within me? Why had I begun to notice so many disabled individuals panhandling? I had joked with my friends prior to this event that I wanted to get dressed in old clothes and try panhandling. There’s a part of me to this day that wishes I had done so.

Why was this event so powerful for me? Why do I consider it one of the major life changing events in my life? It’s another one of those… It’ll take more than one blog entry to explain.

As I sit here writing… I’m asking myself those very question? Why was it so influential? Why have I never forgotten this event?

Remember my simple definition of a disability… “anything that keeps us from doing, or trying, or feeling good about ourselves.” It was the complete realization that who I was, who I wanted to be, what I thought I was and who I could be didn’t match.

To be continued in my next blog…