How Handicapped are we?
So the big question of the day how handicapped are we and who has handicaped us. What excuse do we use as to why we are not where we want to be.
At a very young age I learned that my dad was different. As I got older I learned what a true Superman was all about. When other boys sat around and said that my dad is rougher and tougher than your dad I knew from the very bottom of my heart my dad was the roughest toughest of them all. I did not have to say it I just knew.
My dad in the nine months of my mother's pregnancy. Lost his leg in a saw mill accident, went through many surgeries,overcame a morphine addiction, learned how to walk on an artificial leg, married my mother, went to college, got a job,put my mother and him in a house, and paid for me to be born.
This is not where the story ends. As I was growing up I do not remember a day that my dad did not work to support his family. He hunted, he fished, and raised a garden. For enjoyment we camped, rode snowmobile,and motorcycles.
Even living in the same house I never heard my father complain. He never used the loss of his leg as a crutch to say that he could not. Even at 76 my dad is hard to stop. They just acquired 10 + acres of timbered ground and my dad plans on logging it.To this day the only way my dad will use a handicap placard is when the parking lot is covered in snow and ice.
I have seen my dad at the bottom of some canyon with deer and elk down. Out in the middle of some stream with a fishing pole in one hand and a stringer of fish from his belt loop. I remember the day they kicked him off from the snowmobile race circut as he had figured a way to take a stock machine and modify it and still out run built machines two classes higher than his stock machine.
Now to get the jest of all of this if my dad would have lost another half inch of his left leg they would not have been able to fit him with an artificial. You must realize that only having 8 inches of stump creates a very rough go on a artificial leg. Yes it is above the knee.
So to me nothing is impossible all I have to do is figure out how I'm going to attack so that I can overcome.That is how I was raised that is how I was taught not by word but by example.
This is why I appreciate WA as a whole community. What we have here is that we learn by example not by words alone. By using these standards we see that it works and gets results.
Thank You
Jim
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How handicapped am I? Blind from birth. Survived 3 strokes and I am still kicking. Today in my 60s I am slower but still mentally sharp. I Always wanted a Ph.D and if I drop WA I have the freedom to attain that goal.
I hope I will never sink into a pessimistic complainant, it is not in my nature, and I'm the kind of person who jumps into every opportunity for 200%, but then again I still have 2 legs, I don't know what it would be like, missing some body parts. Your Dad cope with it in an incredible way! And gave you such a great example! Awesome!
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Just remember Whatever Your Dad can do, you have to do better. Best Wishes, Sadie.
I have a long way to go
Jim
You'll reach there.