My Normal Abnormalities July 15, 2008

by Maria R. Palacios
copyright 2007

The normal in me can tell you
about distracted bones
that refused to learn
about motion,
about fingers that speak
a language of tangible deviations
and feet that fell asleep
before their time.

The normal in me
is the underexposed flesh
half shown to you
as you explore my imperfections
pretending that your hands are deaf
to the whisper of my scars.

My normality
has been redecorated
as an unusual
biological masterpiece,
a human canvas
displayed in front of you
the artist who values
the rare
the sensual
the woman.

Heavy Things On My Way July 29, 2007

These are the kinda things that bring the worst out of me! Just to give you an idea of how my walk to work looks. At least once a day I find myself having to find a way around or having to go all the way back to the beginning because there is something blocking the sidewalk.

I am not going to go into how frustrating this whole situation is for me. So, I am trying to figure out a way to make people aware of how to be more considerate to people in wheelchairs.

I have been through all the phases you can think of: denial “oh, they are probably there to drop someone off; ” anger (more like, pissed off!) “i’m gonna make a sticker with a sweet ‘don’t-fucking-block-the-sidewalk’ sort of message that glues onto their car FOREVER so that they FOREVER remember to find a legal way to park,” acceptance “ok, so this is my opportunity to create awareness about people in wheelchair in a positive way…how, though?”

I have been giving it a lot of thought. So I was thinking to create bookmark to put in the lucky car’s windshield! But I have to give the message a twist, kinda like the saying “kill them with kindness.”

If you have any ideas for me, please shoot them this way. This is my first attempt:

“I made this bookmark because you were blocking the sidewalk. I am in a wheelchair and I had to find a way to keep going. So I went through the street…incredibly scary.

Thank you for not blocking the sidewalk next time. Enjoy your bookmark!”

Let me know what your best thoughts are and send me your shot!

Meet the Mother July 15, 2007

For almost 3 years I have been dreading meeting the mother. And, for that matter, the father and the sister and the brother…Oh god, not to mention the grandma!

So this weekend I met the mother. Young is her name.

Let me give you some background so you know what I’m talking about. A couple of months into our relationship, James’ parent came to visit him in San Francisco. I was thinking, with a little hesitance of course, “yeah, I get to meet his parents!” (for the record: in my culture meeting the parents doesn’t necessarily mean that you are about to get hitched). So the topic of meeting the parents popped and the first thing I hear from James is, “I am afraid that my parents may freak out when they meet you.” “Is it because they won’t be able to handle my awesomeness,” I thought. But nope, it wasn’t my awesomeness, it was my wheelchair what he thought they would freak out about. To make a long story short, they did freak out! And for almost 3 years James and I have been perplexed and frustrated with the whole absurdity of the situation. They came to visit again and again and never wanted to meet both of us, just James. Which felt quite shitty for me given how involved we were becoming.

Ok, so finally they started to be interested in meeting me. Around May, his sister Jean came to check me out…just her. And apparently I passed the test and she went back to Atlanta and reported. Then this weekend, Young, his mother came to check me out…just her.

The problematic thing here is that I wasn’t sure which test I was supposed to pass. I was a bit confused. I soon realized that I had to prove to them that I wasn’t going to be a burden for his son. Ok, so in order to contain myself from running away from such a demoralizing (in my opinion) situation I wore for once in a long time, my psycho suit. I love too much what I have with James and figured that this could be a one more learning experience for me depending on my approach to it. I decided that my main question would be to ask what were they afraid about? What was their concern?

By the way, Mrs. Song, is a Psychiatrist. One would think that she would be able to handle this unfair and absurd situation just a bit better from the beginning and within the doors of her house.

Anyway, it went surprisingly well! And she must be in the process of writing a positive report back to “daddy” because I think I passed the test with her too.

So you may want to know her answer to my big question was, I assume. “Basically, daddy needs more time to be mentally prepared to meet you. He is afraid of liability issues, and what if you get really sick, and how ’bout the house chores [was daddy afraid that James would not have a slave as a lifetime partner to cook, serve clean?]…James would have to do it all and what if and what if and what if…” I thought, though, that these where valid questions or wondering.

But aren’t James and I a bit too old to judge that for ourselves. I still went on with my psycho suit and made her understand that we have it figured out. She listened carefully and was understanding, I think, but still keep coming up with more what if’s.

At the end both James and I understood that they were always going to find more what if’s. But the best outcome of all was that she understood how good of a relationship James and me have and seemed happy for us.

I was glad to meet her and to show her our life! We may even go to Atlanta in November to meet “daddy.” Will he be mentally ready to meet me?”