more on that

Let's not forget my prediction: My experiment with creating posts using the techniques I use to create a dance piece is bound to get interesting.

When I first sat down and worked on yesterday's post, there was a lot of content. A whole lot. After much processing (and even a dry-run with TheMIG), it ended up just as you see it. A photo and a couple of sentences. That's it. It was just supposed to hang there. Like art.

Think about when you look at an art installation, or when you watch a performance. As a witness you might never really comprehend the artist's intention. But that's not always what it's about, is it? (Just in case: No) Part of it the art experience is that you get to interpret what you see.

Yesterday's post was intended to make you think. Because yesterdays incident made ME think.

Anyhow, now that I'm seeing yesterday's comment-page potentially becoming a slap-fest (and I don't like that) , here's your "post-performance, meet the artist" moment.
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This is a rewind for you of what actually transpired yesterday between me and the developmentally disabled GroceryBagger. In real time this went very fast, and feelings were intertwinded with thoughts and words, so this as close to verbatim as I can get for you. But it's pretty damn accurate:

Bagger says: "I feel so sorry for you. You only have one leg."

I think to myself: YOU feel sorry for ME??! That's interesting. I was just feeling sorry for YOU!

Then I think: This is a trip. I'm often telling people, "Ohhh...it's just a leg." I'm just glad to be alive and have my mind in tact, and here you are GroceryBagger, and your mind is NOT in tact but you've got this great job (looove TraderJoe's) and you are working hard and you seem to be doing just fine. (I'm often grateful for my "in tact" mind, by the way--part of my accident trauma involved major blood loss and flatlining twice. Extensive neurological screening was part of my rehab. Supposedly, I'm "fine"...hehe).

Then I think to myself: This is probably the most sincere sympathy/empathy I will get all day (because on the average, at least 3 people will say something to me), and this comment is genuine and honestly sweet. Too bad they aren't all like this.

But in response, all I SAY to her is: "Oooooh, it's not so bad."

And she says: "Well, I really am sorry."

And I say: "Thank you. It's really okay, though. In the end, we ALL have something about ourselves that isn't perfect."

And then I drive off thinking to myself: I can't believe how quick I am to get all up in other people's business and judge them and make assumptions about who they are and guesses at what I think they are thinking and feeling...and I do this assumption thing all the time, even though I'm in the midst a lifelong lesson in about being personally sick to death of people making assumptions about me. Interesting.
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I had another thing like yesterday happen to me a couple of months ago.

My cousins had come to town and a bunch of us went to a winery in Napa to do some wine tasting before lunch. My cousins have many talents, but one of them is that they are awesome with kids, the wife-half of the duo having been a teacher and administrative educator, and the hubby-half having an affinity for the kind of magic tricks that you can do anywhere and amaze all your friends (and his tricks are not just for kids, because I'm pushing 40 and I'm still entranced by his skill and charm).

Anyhow, this day at the winery was set up for families with a bar-b-que and live music, and something else (was it a motorcycle show??--hmmm, maybe I did lose a few braincells). It's a small and casual little winery, so outside of the tasting room, there were kids playing about, including my own...the rest of us were inside sampling. The HubbyCousin left those of us who were tasting to poke around.

When he came back, there was a little girl running alongside him. I think she was ohhhh maybe 8-ish. She came up to our little group that was standing in a semi-circle sipping and chatting, and started introducing herself (kind of in a stiff, formal way that made me think she has been taught "on our planet, this is how people greet each other for the first time"). It quickly became clear that she had a developmental disabiltiy.

When she gets around to me she says, "Why are you on crutches?"

To which I reply "Well, cuz I only have one leg, see?" and as I look downward to indicate the obvious, her eyes widen and tears start streaming down her face. She was howling that is was sooooo bad, and soooo horrible, and weeping....and then noticing the scars on my arm, and wailing about that, too....and if I recall, I think she even threw her arms around me (an odd detail to be unsure about, but it was an intense moment, and I can't be certain).

It was tough.

So I start to run through my standard dialog for kids which includes all the things kids really want to know in 6 short sentences:
It was a car accident.
It didn't hurt.
It was a surgery, where they put you asleep so you don't feel anything--do you know what a surgery is?
I sometimes wear a robot leg, and sometimes I don't.
I'm okay.
I do everything you do, only maybe a bit differently, and I'm even a dancer.

I tried to tell her that I was fine, and that yes it is sad, but that it really is okay....and the other adults in the bunch were helping calming her down, too. Someone finally suggested that we all go back outside so she could play some more, and she basically just kind of stopped crying, wiped her face, spun on her heels and left. I moment later, we all moved outside to watch the band. Shecame over to our table to try and get HubbyCousin to teach her a magic trick, and then she almost sat on my lap and started showing me what she could do.

The whole experience was very odd to me because while I just did not know what to do with myself at that moment of outburst, but I fully appreciated the genuinity of that moment with her. It made me think a lot about how grief is so different in other cultures. You know, the cultures that actually let you lament when someone dies. You get to wail. Since ummm, that's really how you feel and it's part of the grief process. Man, it's just all very fascinating to me what is socially acceptable to think or say or do when wer are having an intense emotion or experience. Especially since we all have intense emotions and experiences.
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And so alllll of this begs my next knit-think-knit-think question:
Why will I accept the comment from the person with a develpmental disability as sincere and honest, just because they lack the ability to censor themselves...while on the other hand, if JoeAverage is having an intense emotional response to seeing me, he had better not say anything to me, or I shall deem him a rude asshole.

Interesting. Aint it?