Beth uses her seizures and falling as a metaphor for the difficulties that people face, and enjoins her friends to see people's falls (in the sense of adverse circumstances) as an opportunity to be the hero we imagined ourselves as children.
I fall quite often. It comes free with the bad hips, bad knees, bad ankles and bad feet. What I have learned is there is no point to fighting it. When I feel me going down, I bring me down instead of trying to stay upright. People often think I just suddenly decided to sit. Indeed, I did. I decided that suddenly sitting would be better than suddenly slamming into the floor. Gravity is a harsh mistress.
It's peculiar who will stop to help and who will make it a point to not see that any help is needed. Some people are terrified to acknowledge that others are having difficulties, even small ones. To notice the needs of others would force them to have to consider helping. To refuse to help would make them Bad People. But to offer help would undermine their autonomous self-image, since in the act of rendering real assistance, the helper and the person being helped become one in their goal. And some people fear being helped for exactly that reason, that loss of the illusion of independence. I mean, it is an illusion. We are all interdependent, we truly cannot live without each other.
Posts
Tazu Sasaki (1932-1998)
4 days ago
3 comments:
I hear you ... bad knees, ankles, feet ... the bane of my existance ;D
I once made the silly mistake ... during a period that my knees had lulled me into a false sense of security ... of going ice-skating. As I was standing at the railing talking to a friend, another guy, sped towards me, slammed on the brakes and skidded into my blade with his (I somehow still think it was meant as a prank). I instantaniously crashed to the ground as my knee buckled and gave way. When I came round from the "Pain Black Out", I was surrounded with people not knowing what to do and two guys skating towards me with the Ice-Hockey stretcher.
I pulled my self up at the railing and limped off the ice, leaving the two guys holding the stretcher dumb-founded, yet no one offered a shoulder to help me limp off the ice... I don't know how long I had been "out of it", but it had to have been a while as to allow the two guys to mobalise the stretcher...
I think sometimes it also comes down to fear of not knowing what to do...
This is interesting or at least the social reaction to falling is. Only one fall out of my wheelchair elicited an immediate and positive response. Of all places I was on 5th Ave. and 14th Street when I hit pot hole and fell onto the street. For those unfamiliar with New York City, this is a very busy intersection and to make matters worse it was darn near rush hour. I was very worried that a car would careen through the intersection as I was on the ground and would be hard to see. Within seconds I was surrounded by a small circle of people who told me "don't worry, take your time getting back into your wheelchair we will make sure you don't get hit". No one asked to help and I just got back into my wheelchair and like a football huddle we all dispersed at the same time.
Very interesting observations. My first impression is that the tendency for people to pretend they don't see when others need help is so they can continue their fantasy that they will never be the one requiring help!
Very well said, yanub.
Post a Comment