Don't Ask if You Can't Tell...

For some people, their bliss is more important to them than doing the right thing. So they stay willfully ignorant. * To be clear, I have never experienced this personally--at least not in a way I noticed. But it happens to many, many of us. Like those people in wheelchairs who freeze to death outside their apartment building because nobody will open the door for them, or stop in their passing to call up (a very inaccessible feature for people in wheelchairs, I might add, as the keypad for an aparttment building is only eye-level to an able-bodied person) for someone to unlock the door. Maybe the person in the wheelchair is shy about asking those entering the building to hold it for them--if any happen by. Or maybe because it IS a cold night, nobody is going near the building doors either to go in OR come out. So those willfully unseen suffer:( This reminds me of my four years living in a downtown area, and all the unhomed individuals I saw every single day. I gave everything extra that I had--in terms of blankets or furniture of pillows--to the nearby homeless shelter. I know that the reason some of those without a home WERE without a home was not always all the individual's fault. Many times it was because of a mental or physical disability that made them difficult to maintain on payroll. I can relate to THIS on a personal level. Vision problems hinder my speed behind the cash register, as well as (probably) multiple other areas where I would look for entry-level work. Physical issues make it necessary for me to work slowly and with deliberation. I can't fly through a task like other people my age. And I'm very sure that would annoy anyone coming to a store or restaurant on their lunch break:( Not to mention, in a doctor or hospital setting, I'm labeled as a fall risk, and if I get over-tired, I would certainly become a liability for employers. None of this is my fault, and nothing "wrong" with the unhomed is necessarily their fault either. That's the defining characteristic of a disability, for Heaven's sake! But it does make us difficult to understand by sight, and as mentioned, that turns some people off. Their bliss matters to them much more. To preserve that, instead of being smart and working through their own insecurities to find a way of helping which makes them comfortable AND helps the helpless, they ignore the problem. Better not seen and not heard, right? This is why I will forever tell an overly sorry (but not sorry enough to use the other stall) able-bodied person who uses the big stall in the bathroom "I'm used to it." Or why I will give disrespectful individuals dirty looks in public and mutter almost audibly to the ignorant as I pass by them angrily. I've also been known to stomp tf out of my walker whenever I'm annoyed at somebody who asks me if I need help. Without any visible reason for asking:( If I NEED help, I will ask for it. I've been blessed with faculties enough to advocate for myself. No one need assume otherwise.