Handicap

This morning Michael was watching TV in his room. As I walked by his door, a great song started playing. So I walked in his room and started dancing. I don’t dance well, so I don’t do that in front of very many people. Michael jumped up and started dancing with me. So there we were….a lady who is not a dancer and probably too old to be dancing around like that and a boy whose feet are so crooked that he shouldn’t be walking, much less dancing on them! We had a blast.

In France I had a handicapped son. I’m learning that in America I’m not supposed to say “handicapped”, so I have a son with special needs. But personally I like the word “handicap”. Among the definitions for handicap that I found was this: “A disadvantage given to a superior contender to level the playing field” and ”an additional weight or other hindrance imposed upon the one possessing superior advantages, in order to equalize, as much as possible, the chances of success” That makes me think of the verse that says that we each have a race marked out for us. My Michael runs his with a “handicap”. There must be something about his heart that made him “special”, a superior contender. Maybe instead of having a child with "special needs" we should say we have a child who is a "superior contender".

Of course I don’t want to ignore the fact that there is heartache involved in loving a child who is handicapped. Another definition was: “something that makes progress difficult”. I remember a scene from the movie “Ray” about the life of Ray Charles. In the scene, the little boy had gone blind and was feeling his way around a room. His mother was standing in the corner, quiet, not letting him know she was there, and crying as she watched him struggle and feel his way around, both of them adjusting to life with this “handicap”. That scene took me off guard and touched a pain deep in my heart and made me weep! There is certainly pain involved in being “handicapped” or in loving a “handicapped” person and watching them go through life with progress being difficult.

As I walked out of his room this morning, out of breath from dancing and sad that things jiggle that didn’t use to jiggle….but that’s another subject, I thought about how I need to be more like Michael. Michael doesn’t know the concept of “us and them”, we’re just all us. He laughs when something is funny and cries when he is sad, regardless of where he is, who is watching and what they might think. He doesn’t judge people for dancing poorly or for dancing at all. He gives high fives to strangers at basketball games, he cheers for the losers and the winners, he doesn’t worry about what people think of him, he loves everyone.

So I’ve decided that more people need a “handicapped” or “special needs person” in their life. I think I’ll start being a handicapped mother, a friend with special needs, a wife with special needs….one who doesn’t judge, one who accepts everyone, one who jumps up and starts dancing with people regardless of how good or bad they dance. One who cheers for the winners and the losers the same, one who doesn’t see anyone for what they can or cannot do or how they look or smell or succeed or fail.

However I don’t think I'll drink out of strangers' cups at McDonald’s.........