Superpowers Beat Paper

I often write the word "dis/ability" with that slash in there to designate that those of us with disabilities sometime possess abilities that other lack. Call them superpowers. I do.

My friends Beth and Meridian. circa 2001.
FYI: This story is not about either of
them, nor about Beth's piñata, seen here.

Playing piñata is a unique sport. There's a spirit of cooperation—we're all working together to smack that thing, to bust it open so that we can get at the good stuff inside. But there's also a little competition in that some of us will hit it, some won't, and ultimately one person will deliver the final plow that sents bits of paper and candy flying everywhere.

Piñatas possess a special place in my heart. When the blindfold gets wrapped around my face, the broomstick placed in my hands, and I'm spun around to stagger toward that swaying paper mâché target in the air, I feel at home. And I feel super. Over the years I've cultivated an advantage in learning to use my other senses like superpowers to find that piñata in the darkness behind the blindfold. I get my bearings in space, feel the air and objects around me. I listen, I hear. I even smell and taste. And then I swing.

At one person's piñata party, I did this a little too well. I was the first at bat, and also the last. That's right—I took down the piñata so fast that no one else even got to play. In the moment I felt great because the "dis" was diminished by the "ability" and I got to flaunt my superpowers. But in hindsight I'm flooded with remorse, for I ignored Stan Lee's Law of "With great power comes great responsibility," like every good superhero must.

So if you're reading this birthday girl, I owe you a piñata, and several chances for you to swing.

Triple Dissed

Funny how this year, as I've been focusing on my primary dis/ability, I've taken on some others for short stretches of time. Back in May I was walking with a cane for a couple weeks, and in April I lost my voice for a few days. And now I can't hear out of one ear due to an infection brought on by a flu that had me totally immobile for a spell.

Not seeing so well can be a bit disorienting, but hearing every sound come at me from one sound only amplifies that experience. Usually when someone calls my name, I know the general direction the voice is coming from and can wave over that way regardless of whether or not I see who it is. But that's blown for now. 

I'm realizing why a lot of people adapting to shifts in ability prefer to stay home: it's a source of embarrassment, a pain to explain, and very vulnerable territory both physically, socially, and emotionally. Going to the clinic to get my ears examined turned me into a three-ring circus of dis/ability, performed multiple times for receptionists and medical assistants and doctors. I need help filling out the form and repeat what you said please and boy do my joints ache right now. 

I've learned not to apologize for any of this stuff: I never say "sorry" for not being able to see because that's not my fault. Some of the people who work at these places are learning not to apologize either, and that's good because my dis/abilities are not their fault either. An apology is an empty substitute for help and as a person with a dis/ability (or two, or three, depending on the day) I'll take a singular act of help over a hundred apologies.

Good news is: flu is gone, no more body aches, but I still can only hear out of half of my ears. And of course I can half-see out of both of my eyes.

Stay tuned!

Watch My Bag

Who is the thief in this coffeeshop?

It's not your fault. It might be mine.

In a café some months ago a friend asked me to watch her bag while she went to the restroom. What was to watch? Especially in the years since that corner of our neighborhood got gentrified, right? No one goes into other people's purses anymore, especially in a bustling, brightly lit café. So I may have gone up to the counter to refill my tea, but only for a moment.

And then, a year later, came CONES, the show I made about my vision loss. And my friend saw it and said, "Now I know how that happened—How I asked you to watch my bag and all my credit cards got stolen out of it."

Huh?

"Yeah, I guess I shouldn't asked you to do that."

Hmm...

Let's return to the scene of the crime: A table at a coffee shop (that's what we used to call them before gentrification) with two chairs facing each other just three feet apart. My friend asks me to watch her bag, which is just three feet from my face, and I have no trace of being visually impaired—I am passing for able-bodied and, in all honesty, would clearly see if anyone were to start rifling through that bag for anything. Still, 30 minutes later, sometime after we'd had coffee and tea, my friend went to use her credit card at the grocery store, and it was gone.

Conclusions: People still steal stuff in gentrified neighborhoods. No one stole that card out from under my nose, they stole it from behind my back. And this did not happen because of my dis/ability, it happened because I got careless for a moment, and it only takes a moment for someone to steal something out of someone's bag.

Sorry about that.

So, who wants to go get coffee with me?
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Photo of "Awaken the Mud" by Beth Nixon. See her work at www.ramshackleenterprises.net.