Something special

Shopping at Aldi is on the agenda. My husband and I usually do this together. Ever since I have a motorized wheelchair that can be steered with a joystick, I’m very happy to go, because it’s one of the few times I leave our property. So, on this Wednesday too, we are out and about together, loading everything we need into the trolley and then queuing for the checkout. When I turn my wheelchair around at the checkout, I notice the man behind us looking at me curiously.

As we continue our journey, I tell my husband about this incidence and that I have once again felt a little stared at. I conclude my remark: “That’s just the way it is when you’re in a wheelchair, you’re always …” and leave the sentence unfinished. But my husband ends the sentence for me: “… something special,” he says, making me smile once again.

Because I can actually decide whether I feel stigmatized, like someone who doesn’t really belong because she doesn’t conform to the norm, or whether I see myself as “something special”. In fact, it happens once in a while that people admire the way I (and probably everyone else who uses a wheelchair like this on a daily basis) move unerringly, quickly and with a relatively high degree of precision in my wheelchair.
So why do I find it so difficult to accept this given fact of being in a wheelchair and the looks associated with it? I would very much like to have this different, positive focus that says: I am special.

What supposed “flaw” makes you special?

 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. Psalms 139,14 ©NIV