Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Different abilities


People are all shapes, sizes, colours and have an amazing range of abilities and disabilities.

That might be something of a truism, but face a rush hour in a busy city and it is amazing what God can do with two eyes, a nose and a mouth! It is equally fascinating to see how it is possible to manoeuvre in the most confined spaces and achieve things that others would find extremely difficult.

Waiting at a busy station yesterday morning, in the space of about ten minutes, two people passed me in their electric wheelchairs. Both were in their late 20s-early 30s and both were seriously disabled…or, perhaps in their case, ‘differently abled’ was the more appropriate term. These days, the politically correct devise expressions that tend to be long-winded ways of saying the same thing. However, for these two individuals, their courage was impressive. Whatever might or might not have been their physical strengths and weaknesses, they were brave to manipulate electric wheelchairs in the early morning rush. I would have been scared, but they were as seemingly carefree as anybody on their two feet at that time of the morning.

On the opposite side of the scale, where on earth do skateboarders find the courage to skim into mid-air, turn somersaults and still land on the ground on their skateboard?

Perhaps we should be glad of those who have different abilities: in that way we do not need to feel too ashamed of our own cowardice!

God bless,
Sr. Janet