JD LeJeune

If only we would all let our outter shell fall away and reveal our true, loving selves. It can be challenging or it can be the easiest thing we have ever done! - JD

The beautiful kindness in people CBC News Viewpoint | April 18, 2006 | More from Disability Matters From: CBC.ca

This column will feature three writers, each with a different disability. They all have something to say about living with a disability and how they view awareness and attitudes toward disabilities in Canada. The column will deal with the rights of people with disabilities, eliminating inequality and discrimination, and issues of self-help and consumer advocacy. Our plan is to rotate among our columnists to have a new column each month.

Ed Smith Ed Smith is a retired educator and full-time writer. His humour column runs in several papers and magazines and he has had eight books published. He has been quadriplegic since 1998. Ed lives in Springdale, Nfld.

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I was being interviewed by a young student who had chosen me as an author to profile in a school project for his English class. I was somewhat flattered until his mother told me she had chosen me for his profile because he couldn’t find any writer he liked. She admired my writing, she said, and her son had a good sense of humour. OK.

The questions were fairly routine until he hit me with the Big One.

What are the advantages …? I hadn’t thought about that before. I could list the disadvantages until the cows come home. I could write volumes on the disadvantages of being in a wheelchair. But advantages?

“Not many,” I said. “None that I can think of.”

Silence on the other end of the line. He was allowing me to think, obviously certain I could come up with something if given enough time.

All the cute little responses that are no longer cute ran through my mind: One pair of shoes will last a lifetime. The cuffs of your pants don’t drag in the dirt. You don’t get tired from walking. No one expects you to do those stupid dances. You never trip over your shoelaces. Your feet don’t get damp from the water on the wet street soaking through the holes in the soles of your shoes.

“Well,” I said, “one pair of shoes will …” I stopped. Even a 12-year-old would see that as shallow. There was still silence at the other end of the line. His faith in me to come up with something meaningful was boundless. Can’t destroy a child’s faith in the author he’s profiling, even if the author is his mother’s choice. Let’s see, now, the advantages of being in … Okay, even one advantage.

‘ To help you, my friend, is a blessing’

And then a memory from the night before came to mind.

It was a regular meeting of our local Lions Club. One Lion drives me in my van to the hall and accompanies me up the long ramp and through several doors into the “den” on the second floor. Someone moves quickly to remove a chair and make a place for me at the table.

Another Lion places my dinner in front of me – even though it’s a “serve yourself” meal – almost before anyone else can get theirs. He beats two or three others to the punch. Several more offer me drinks. My dishes are whisked away from in front of me as soon as I finish the main course and apple pie and ice cream appear magically on my tray. That’s how it is all evening.

When I thank one of the Lions for his help he looks at me for a moment.

“To help you, my friend,” he says, “is a blessing.”

I didn’t have to think much longer to finally answer my young student interviewer: “It reminds me of the kindness in people. The beautiful kindness in people.”

I didn’t get reminded of that very much when I was driving a car. Quite the opposite. Kindness and courtesy seem to disappear when most people get behind the wheel. It isn’t difficult to make contact with people at a traffic light when you’re either too slow to get moving or too fast off the mark. Or when you turn without thinking, causing another driver to brake suddenly. Or when you back into the side of a vehicle that’s unexpectedly parked practically across your driveway. Very few of those experiences amount to a blessing.

‘We’ll be here when you come out ‘

And then I remembered another, somewhat different occasion several years ago.

We are in Toronto and I am wheeling down a sidewalk in a commercial area. Somehow I’ve gotten separated from the others walking with me, probably because I’m looking for a certain specialty store and they aren’t. Finally, I see the familiar sign up ahead. And then I see the group hanging out in front of the entrance.

They are the poster boys for your typical street gang. Late teens. A couple with headbands. Sleeveless T-shirts. Prominent tattoos on bare shoulders. Shades.

I come to a halt in a hurry. Do I carry on as if they aren’t there or what? The innate stubbornness of most Newfoundlanders comes to the fore and I wheel up to the lads. They are more or less blocking the entrance, at least for wheelchairs.

Then it happens. One particularly tough-looking character suddenly sees me and immediately jumps to open the door. One of his buddies goes through the door ahead of me and opens the inside door. They stand aside to let me through.

“Thanks very much, guys,” I manage. My surprise must be showing.

“No problem,” says the first fellow, wearing a headband. “We’ll be here when you come out.”

“Being in a wheelchair reminds me that everyone has the capacity for kindness,” I said to my young friend on the phone. “The beautiful capacity for kindness.”

I hope he understands.