Where indeed?!
I didn't realize that you had asked me on the list, so I've edited my
answer to leave out
the more personal and private examples:
When I was in Rochester in an apartment building for the old and decrepit
(following TM, like a fool I was trying to work for a cruel ingrate who
berated me for being in a wheelchair but that's another story)
in this apartment building there were people who would not
hold the door, watch me, through the glass doors, struggle
with the key and not open the door,
people who would shove me out the way....
I have rarely been shoved in life. Not that I
was physically imposing, but I was just not someone
who got pushed around.
I offered free crochet classes. There were people
who would tear down my signs for these classes.
I would find my signs in the garbage and repost them
or print out more.
In the supermarket up there, there are wheelchair
lanes-- these are wider. I could seldom get the
wheelchair lane because people preffered the wider lane.
The particular cruelty in this was that these were
people on the same bus as I was, so if I were
to be able to catch it, I would have to bruise knuckle
squeeze through the narrow lane (shorter line)
There are kind strangers, but they are few and far between.
An angelic friend from college flew in from Chicago, spent two weeks finding
an apartment for me, packing up the apartment i was in, and checked
on my house. She contact others form college who raised money for me
to get my house rehabbed and enabled me to return home.
My grad schools did nothing but continue to ask me to give money.
I have had outrageously horrible experiences and have also known
some amazing grace.
My neighbor who cuts grass as a side business with his grandson,
charged me $25 to cut my small city lot.
He destroyed hundreds of dollars worth of flowers that i can no
longer replant nor afford to replace.
He razed my once huge white rose bush
to the ground in spring 2009. For some reason it looked like a weed
to him. It's returned now, but is half the size it once was.
I tried repeatedly to tell him not to cut this or that, but as his wife joked
with me , he doesn't like flowers and had taken all of hers up. He
would mow before I woke and would awaken me, now that my bedroom is
on the first floor of my house and by my front.....
even when i didn't need it so that i would end up paying $100 plus a month.
I make paper from plants and had hired a young mentally
challenged man to weed for me last year and help me collect plants
from my yard
for me to process. I had these stacked by my wheelchair ramp. The neighbor
came in my yard and took the plants. I called him up and he said they
were in another neighbor's trash. I rolled over to this pile and dug through
it and they weren't. I went online and looked it up so I could be
accurate and wrote him
a note explaining that he destroyed a year's crop and the cost of this material
if I had to buy it --- (milkweed silk is $40/lb and mulberry (kozo)
is also expensive.
He scribbled angrily on my note that he wouldn't be mowing my lawn anymore
and after all he done for me for FREE.
I was bemused. When/what had he done for me for free? I was paying
to have my plants decimated in my tiny lot. Turns out that when the friends
who were supposed to do the yard while I was in Rochester were on vacation
he mowed the yard. They said this was a couple of times at most. Whatever.
They too for a time paid him to mow their yard..... and **I** hadn't asked him
to mow for FREE.
But back to your point. This neighbor, wife, and grandson live on the
corner, across the street from me on the corner.
They have 3 vehicles. They have NEVER EVER asked or offered
to shop for me or pick something up for me. NO ONE HAS.
Now when I was able bodied, people were always stopping by,
offering to assist with this or that, helping me dig up trees in my yard.
When I didn't need help, I was offered. No one offers because
now I need it and they don't want to feel obligated. They
fear that my need might be contagious, or I might ask them
too much.
I asked friends who live a block away ( the ones who mowed the yard
for a year) -- I thought they were friends anyway, to go to the store
for me ONCE when I needed a
prescription filled as my aide was on vacation.
The woman cost me $20 EXTRA because
she didn't present the prescription discount card I had sent with her and
she said she was told the store lady had already run it?
Made no sense to me, but I said thank you and understood the
transaction to mean that if I were to asked them to do me any favors
it would cost me. I can't afford it.
I'm an artist and have been juried in several shows at the Arts Council
They have NEVER taken a picture of my work in any of the shows,
though they know there's no paratransit for me to get to the show.
They know I am paralyzed and in a wheelchair!
And before you ask, YES, I've ASKED.
Mowing: after six weeks of calling and looking I found a gentle
young man with riding mower nearly the width of my yard who
charged the same amount, but only comes twice a month
in summer or once every 3 weeks in fall, does the yard
quietly in about 15 minutes. And this year I got
to see my star lilies, grape hyacinth, irises, tulips,
ice winged narcissus, balloon flowers, peonies,
echinacea (white and purple), daisies, sweet pea
and red runners, spiderwort,
Good DEEDS? I would be happy if people just did the LITTLE they are
supposed to do:
I went without fresh food for two weeks because the service that
sends my aid didn't tell me she was
going on vacation, BEFORE she was going on vacation so that I might
have stocked up.
I'm a pesco vegetarian, so opened cans of tuna fish, made crepes, and
rooled down the ramp
to grab some arugula ( rocket) and stir fried it, ordered Chinese
Food, ordered dried stuff from Amazon.com.
They offered subs but three strikes you're out. I've shifted and used
subs and wasted money of which
I have very little. When I spend $25 to get $60 dollars worth of
groceries and you don't get them all and use up all the time in not
getting them, then I'm SOL. I've basically flushed money down the
toilet.
I give folks a printed from the store's web site list along with PICTURES
locations, amounts and a running total. it takes them the whole of
the two allotted hours to get
these 15 things and no one else but my aide has shopped
successfully eg. When someone comes back with 2 bananas when the list
says 4 pounds, I go hungry for a week.
The apple tree is shedding, so I can be sure to have some fruit this month.
TM has destroyed my life and the only sustaining grace is God's.
A
Akua,
While growing up we were taught that if there was something we could
do to assist another we were expected to do so. This meant like
crossing the street, carrying groceries, etc if we were children.
Then as we were older, it extended to picking up extra groceries
when we shopped for ours, and larger tasks as well.
It seems that these days there are so many more churces than there
were when I was a child, and I find less people helping those in
need of help. When I attended church we had a bulletin that would
would enlist the help of those who could and ask those who needed
help or knew of anyone within the congregation or out that needed it.
Is this something that just doesn't happen anymore? Do people not
offer to help each other any longer unless they know you? I remember
my mother giving somebody gas money when they helped her with a ride
home when her car died and them putting it back in her pocket many
times
Hugs, Barbara A in Auburn CA
-----Original Message-----
From: Akua <a...@artfarm.com>
To: tmic-list@eskimo.com
Sent: Tue, Sep 28, 2010 12:25 pm
Subject: Re: [TMIC] It's my birthday
Jim,
I hear you. 11/14/2005 I fell to the floor and have yet to stand. I
live alone, have been abandoned by friends and family, lost my
employment ( fired because I was in a wheelchair), almost lost my
home twice when a pipe burst while I was in another city in rehab,
lost all my savings. TM destroyed life as I knew it. YET I breathe
without assistance, think, dream and write. It is infinitely less
than what I want, or what I did. But there are still ways to be, to
contribute and things to enjoy.
I have help once a week for two hours to do grocery shopping because
that's all I am allowed.
I can't afford to pay the $50/hour "private pay" so United Way
offers subsidized assistance --
so I pay $25 a week to get my $60 worth of groceries.
If there were some modicum of infrastructure here--- paratransit-- I
could get therapy and work and shop for myself. As there is none, I
get none.
I envy you Hawaii and ream of winning some prize that would enable
me to move somewhere
that it is warm all year -- I'm in upstate New York.
I join you in prayer and live in hope for reprieve, healing, relief.
One moment at a time Jim. In this moment, I am up, the sun shines,
pain is at a low murmur and I am keying in the thoughts.
Strength and perseverance,
Akua
I'm Jim and I've only had TM for 6 months. I'm 63 and have led
a >very active life here in Hawaii. In a two day period in March
I >became paralyzed from the waist down. No bladder or bowel
function. >A week of Solu-medrol and then a week of IVIG treatment
that cost >27,000 and no results. Neither my wife or I are able to
work (she >cares for me) and we are going into bankruptcy. We've
lost the >house and live with my son. I cry for my wife who has to
suffer with >me. I pray and pray for relief. I have almost
committed suicide >several times but leaving my wife that way has
held me together. I >can not imagine living like this for 10 or
more years. Kudos to all >of you who have managed some level of
happiness.
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