On Relationships: My 200th Post

It's hard to believe that in a few short 6 months I have written another 100 posts. (I need to get off of this computer and get a life) For my 100th post I wrote about things that are therapeutic for me, because blogging is also therapeutic for me to an extent. So for this post I thought I'd write about something else that blogging fosters--blogging fosters relationships (and it doesn't hurt that relationships is the topic of the next DBC).

I feel like over the last year and a half I've been blogging I've managed to gain a whole bunch of new relationships. To be honest, most of that has nothing to do with blogging, but rather a cold call I made to somewhere to volunteer (another instance of my life being the result of a complete and total accident). However I still feel like blogging has played a part in this too.

One week ago I was in Chicago at the ADAPT Youth Summit (probably about to pass out on a couch). 12 years ago if you had told my mom that I would be sitting in that photo below she would have looked at you like you had 5 heads. 12 years ago I didn't hang out with crips. 12 years ago I pretended like I didn't use a wheelchair (heck, even 3 years ago I pretended like I didn't use a wheelchair, and I'd had that Jazzy for some time already). And storm a government office building...? WHAT?!?!?!

I used to be a very antisocial human being. I used to sit at home alone watching TV all day sulking because of the awfulness that is cripdom. I still sit at home and watch more TV then I should, but at least now I'm not sulking, and at least now while I'm doing it my Jazzy is left plugged into the wall waiting to become charged so I can take it out into the world so that we can kick ass together. That still sounds so weird--someone in a wheelchair going out and kicking ass. It sounds weird, but it's not weird. It's what we do, the ADAPT army. We kick ass.

I used to look down on people who I considered to be more disabled then me. I wish I hadn't spent so long feeling that way, but I think that everybody does. I think it's a normal part of growing up. Even after I stopped looking down on people I still seperated myself from them. I'm glad that I don't feel that way anymore and I'm glad I allow myself to be seen out in public in my chair. I've gained so much from that, from all the opportunities it has brought me, all the relationships it is fostering. I just went and met a whole bunch of my long lost brothers and sisters last week, and together we went out and kicked ass. Together we will continue to kick ass. In my past life I would have never dreamed of doing something like that. In my past life I never would have fathomed feeling such a closeness, such a bond, with people I'd never met before (especially crips I'd never met before). Blogging was certainly a catalyst.

It's amazing what can happen in a year and a half...