Yesterday I faced a decision. Buskerfest, which is an event that I love, was happening. We weren't able to go on Saturday because we had other things that needed to get done. We'd been away for a few days up at the lake and we had to settle back into home, so there was stuff to do. On Sunday we spoke about going to Buskerfest. I faced a decision.
As much as I love the event, I didn't want to go. It was a hot day, the crowds were out on the street and, in previous years, Buskerfest was almost impossible for me to navigate through. People intent on having "FUN! WOW"can be the most impatient and therefore quick to anger. I didn't want to get into a situation that would simply be unpleasant all the way around. There are days that I'm really up to the challenge and the people and the mood of the crowd - and there are days I'm not.
I didn't want to go.
I know Joe enjoys Buskerfest too and I didn't want to take that away from him, because even though he could go without me, I knew he probably wouldn't. I bit the bullet and told Joe that I just didn't feel up to manoeuvring my chair through the crowds. Joe, being Joe, understood and we planned for a very different, much quieter time out.
Throughout the day though, I had to stifle my concerns about how disability affects not my life, but Joe's. I try as much as possible to do all the things that I did before, even if I do them differently. But, I can't always. I CAN do Buskerfest but I have to be up for it, I have to be in the right frame of mind, I have to be feeling really confident in my chair. If any of those things aren't there, I can't. Or. Maybe I won't.
We had a nice day. I'm sure we did. We talked and we laughed and we had a wonderful veggie hot dog from a vendor a few blocks away. We sat in the shade to eat our dogs and people watch. We prepared for the girls coming down for the week to go to summer camp. We felt the sun on our backs as we walked home - something which hasn't happened often this summer in Toronto.
So we didn't go to Buskerfest.
... this year.
1 comment:
You bring up one of the hardest parts of being disabled: how it affects those around us who love us and don't have our disability.
I don't know if I would have been able to do it the other way around, if my husband had been the sick one. My husband doesn't overthink things - he just does them. He doesn't talk about things much, and like your husband, isn't a public writer (nor a private one - but I don't know Joe, so I can't say if he likes to write).
I'm the one who knows my daughter, who is 23, has NEVER had a healthy mother, and my sons, a bit older, had one only when they were too young to remember, who did things like go on hikes with them.
When we traveled with the kids, I was the one who waited at the car, the trailhead, the hotel - because I could only do a few things.
It is what it is, and I can't change it, and I compensated as much as possible along the way, but it isn't what I would have chosen. I mourn that other me, that other family.
Alicia
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