I guess it’s about recognizing the humanity in all of us, really. Today I happened upon an older lady who was walking very slowly down the sidewalk outside of a medical building. I was there because a car accident inflamed a tendon in my wrist. A quick cortisone shot, a soft splint, and a couple of weeks of healing before I can go back to using my wrist as I normally would. The things I take for granted about my body astound me, and I thought of it as I watched this lady sort of meander down the pathway.

I passed her with a quick smile, and then heard a small voice. “Can I hold onto you?” she asked, clearly in need of assistance. As Mary took my arm and we slowly walked down to the correct building, I found out bits of her story. Until the last year, she’d raised four children while working full-time and fulfilling the role of caretaker for her diabetic husband. Mary was active and healthy, fitting in at least two tennis matches a week, eating lots of fresh foods and at a healthy weight. Then she broke her back.
Three back surgeries later, Mary looks fragile, elderly. Less than. People dismiss her, I imagine, as they dismiss anyone who makes them afraid. After all, that could be us one day, right? She speaks without confidence. She’s aware that she’s taking up other’s valuable time and the space on the sidewalk.

Mary was so grateful that I’d taken the time to help that I felt ashamed. The cultural messages fly: be productive, be important, or at least be decorative…or get out of the way.The very young and the very old are marginalized and ignored; the differently-abled among us may fit into a community of others like them, but are ignored by those outside of it.

In our quest to fit the mold of whatever is currently beautiful, we forget that eventually we will have to either break it or be broken by it.

Humbling.