security

	"Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure... Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. " (Helen Keller)
\/	No Guarantees
	If your disability or your previous experience in life affects your behaviour (and once you have had a disability for a while, it is very difficult to tell where the line between disability and previous experience lies), there is only so much you can do to train yourself out of it. If that is the case. It is also quite possible that something about your disability shows without being visible. I know the feeling. People have often interacted with me, and then told me they do not want to be my friends because "my energy is funny." I have had people pick up on the fact that something is different about me and ban me from my alma mater -- in a one-time, unprecedented action by the college. I have been fired from jobs for being too slow and not having a medical certificate that lists this as one of my symptoms. I have been in conversations where I seem unresponsive, because I cannot bring words together quickly enough to participate; or lost arguments where I seem guilty for that same reason.
	We are often left in the position of being forced to forgive, and forgiving, when one is not free to make another choice, that is, when one is always left with the short end, is not fulfilling.
	In my other essay Being different I discussed the will to live. If I had my accident to live over, I would have chosen death. Were I able to reverse the decisions made the day of the accident or the days and months preceding it, I would do so in a minute. But here I am, the accident happened and I am still alive, and would not choose to die tomorrow if that were an option offered me.
	The problem we have on our hands, though, is a world in which it is not the norm to be disabled. Disabled people throughout history have dealt with similar problems (try reading biographies...). Once a person is disabled, the world does not fit right any more, often regardless of the accommodations and concessions made by family and by society. I truly think that society ought to think long and hard before interfering to "save" someone's life, if that person's independence is then compromised.
	Throughout history (at least as far back as the last couple of centuries), people with disabilities have been expected to make concessions for the population at large: "They don't know any better"; "That is the natural order of things"; "Just go and find other people and friends who do accept you"; "You must accept their staring because you in fact look different," are all excuses that have been made for the population at large to make us into second class citizens.
	In good periods, where we can all get enough to eat even if the bully does not buy our candy, people with disabilities can "gloss over" such instances more easily. We are however in a political period where the lower and middle classes are again being squelched down lower than they have been in a long time and class migration is almost a superhuman feat. People with "mild" disabilities, who under normal circumstances could and would want to make themselves useful, find themselves not even being able to get a menial job, and not being able to get their alternative methods of earning or of otherwise participating in society off the ground.
	It is perfectly natural that we have the feelings that we do. No feeling is negative. Feelings are a natural expression of our inner condition and therefore must be allowed an outlet. Our society is not very accepting of feelings. Politicians, who want to tout a successful economy would rather label you as sick, even when what you are showing is a healthy reaction. It simply is so.
	I am not advocating for you to go and defend your (sometimes nonexistent) rights day-in, day out, but (a) to choose your battles carefully, as all people must do; and (b) to find a path of less resistance, that will not constantly put you in the path of bullies. Yes, you will have to make concessions. You will often end up with the short end of the stick. It is not fair. But no one ever promised that life would be fair (except politicians, who do not know what they are talking about).
	I wish I could remember a quote [see above] by Helen Keller. She said something along the lines of: People of her (and our) generation have been raised to expect security, whereas security has never existed in society. Extremely rich people can become poor overnight; perfectly healthy people can become disabled; a seemingly secure job can end; our crops can be destroyed by weather or by mean people; ideas once accepted can later be scorned; industrious people often remain poor; and a lifetime of work can be destroyed in a moment. There are no guarantees, and there is no optimal distribution of resources, in a world of a finite health and limited resources. In essence, this is a condition that all people always have to live with, and some people are simply luckier than others without ever deserving it. Nothing more is promised us in this life.
/\	H (7/08)

No Guarantees