Fathers and Sons

Riding the transit system in the 'special bus' is interesting. Given that every morning I go a different route, I get to see different parts of the city. Given that every other person on the bus has a different life, we go to vastly different places. I now know of services that I never knew existed. It's cool to be plunged into the diversity that is disability.

The other morning I was on the bus with two women. One in a power chair, the other with a walker. Neither were chatterboxes and responded with civil grunts to my 'Good Morning'. I am constantly reminded that being a morning person I can be outright annoying. We dropped of the woman in the power chair at her work place and then we drove for a very long time to get to the next drop point. Here we pulled into a big parking lot and we drove by a 'Pain Management Center'. The bus turned around and then pulled right up beside it's door.

The woman with the walker got up and I could see in her careful movements a long history of living with pain. She glanced at me and wished me a good day and then let the driver guide her down the ramp. I looked out then and saw a father and son heading towards the door. The boy turned to look at the woman getting off the bus and I saw that he was maybe 6 or 7 years old. Even so, he walked old. He walked like little boys should never walk - as if life itself hurt. His dad, a big strapping man, was being bright and cheerful and joking with his son as they headed towards the door. The boy turned to his dad with bright eyes and then for a moment stopped and laughed at something his dad said. I'm sure I saw tears form in his father's eyes as he watched his little boy just stand and laugh.

The laughter over the long, long walk to the clinic began. They, father and son, made that walk together as I watched.

It's not fair.

We shouldn't live in a world where 6 year old boys live in pain.

We shouldn't live in a world where father's watch their children suffer.

But we do live in that world.

Pray God that we all have someone walking beside us making us forget, for just a moment, while we laugh.