#Jr writer fly high instrumental driver#

In the secret recesses of my being, I was thrilled by our exploring and never let an opportunity pass me by. They understood it to be an innocent exploration, but I did not think of it as simply “what kids did” as part of growing up. At that age, that was enough to get by.Īnd yes, a few of my male friends and I “played” around.

What saved me from humiliation and bullying? I was tall, smart, a good student, articulate, pleasant looking, and, thanks to my mother and father’s parenting methods, I grew up kind and thoughtful. Other students and teachers seemed to like me. Each year, I was elected to the Student Council. With my secret intact, I moved through grammar school and junior high unscathed. Even though I didn’t have the words to express what I felt, I intuitively understood that I was different and that I had a secret I had to keep. The feeling that swept through my 3- or 4-year-old self remains with me to this day.

#Jr writer fly high instrumental driver#

My parents invited the young driver of a cattle truck stranded by the storm to stay in our home.Įveryone thought I was asleep that night, but I saw the man naked when he was bathing in our round, metal tub. When I was 3 or 4 years old, a snowstorm closed the highway that ran through our small farming community. I haven’t always been old or crippled, but I have always, always, been queer. In my eighties now, I use a wheelchair to get around. Spina Bifida didn’t begin to cripple me until my late fifties, and even then, my limp was barely noticeable.īut by 65, I was walking with a cane, and from then on it got progressively worse: I went from one cane to two canes, then two canes and a leg brace, then crutches and two leg braces and orthotics. I was born with spina bifida but had the mildest form of it there is. I’ll start here by describing my disability. Being old is another, and being crippled is yet another.

Queer, Old and Crippled: One Person’s Lifeīeing queer is one thing.

While the author uses “crippled” to describe his disability identity, Easterseals does not use this word to describe disabled people. He has generously agreed to let us publish it here on the Easterseals blog.Įditor’s Note: At Easterseals, we believe in giving disabled and LGBTQ+ people the space to share their stories authentically, with the language of their choosing to describe their identities and experiences. Bill Gordon, an 86-year-old in one of my classes, came back with a very personal essay about what it’s like to be growing older now as a gay and disabled American. June is Pride Month, so I assigned “Pride” as a prompt for class this week. And for me, leading those classes is a pleasure: I get to know each writer very well simply by listening to the stories read out loud in class each week. Writers in those classes tell me that writing a story at home to bring to class each week keeps their brains working. When I’m not writing posts for the Easterseals blog, I keep busy leading three different memoir-writing classes every week for older adults here in Chicago. From Beth Finke, a regular contributor for Easterseals: