Sunday, January 07, 2007

Pie Chart

I woke grumpy and stayed grumpy. I caged "Grumpy" in for the whole day and it tired me. Having one of the seven dwarves held captive in your heart for 8 hours is a tad draining. At first I thought that I was on edge because my blood sugar was out of wack. So I took my monitor to work and two hours after eating (where do people find 2 hours between meals and snacks) I took my blood sugar. It was fine. A little high in the morning but completely normal by lunch.

All the while 'grumpy' was banging at the cell I'd locked him in. I had to completely ignore him when I was asked to go to a meeting that was unplanned and I was unprepared for. I had to pay him no heed when someone came in to my office to just chat and catch up. I had to pretend he wasn't there when, not getting attention, he started throwing tantrums that echoed from heart to brain. Oh the things grumpy wanted me to say, the put downs that formed on my lips, the snide remarks that would hurt the victim but entertain me - they were with me all day.

I closed my office door, worked on projects that required typing not interaction. But even there it was hard. Grumpy wanted to grab hold of my fingers and enter into some of the emails I wrote. But I kept slapping him back. By the time Joe came to pick me up I was exhaused, not from the work but from being a warden for that damn dwarf.

Then, at home, I opened the fridge. There it was. Joe had made me a banana cream pie from a "cooking for diabetics" book. The sun shone from that fridge. I fell upon the pie. And what a pie it was too ... the bananas had just the right amount of tang, the graham cracker crust was just plain sexy, and the filling could have been served to God. A piece of pie later, Grumpy was tamed.

It's all about accessibility. You can ramp a building ... but man ... you can also ramp a pie.

It's easier to understand accessiblity when it's about ramps and curbs, about the height of a counter and bars in a toilet. But for other disabilities, it's harder to see the need for accessiblility. My accessible pie reminds me that people need all kinds of adaptions and accomodations. But you know what, I didn't care about any of that ... I didn't care about the politics of pie ... I just sat down and had me a piece of accessible pie.

And I learned something really, really important. Grumpy just loves pie.

3 comments:

  1. Sometimes pie is all that matters :) Glad to see you blogging Dave, I heard you speak years ago, and was impressed. It's nice to hear your voice again.
    Lisa

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  2. What an incredible thought... that we can "ramp" things besides buildings and sidewalks... this is definitely a print-off-and-put-in-everyone's-box post again.

    And I loved the idea of your grumpiness being blamed on one of the seven dwarfs held captive in your heart all day... that thought, and how you developed it is just too cool.

    You have a fine mind, Mr. Hingsburger! Thanks for sharing a piece of it once again! :)

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  3. -another new comment on a very old post(Sorry if I annoy you with these)-

    Everyone seems to forget about the disability if it isn't obvious, or isn't there. Particularly with the more 'brain-affecting' disabilities. People assume it's as simple as being 'just stupid' or something. Great post.

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