A Little Tribute To A Truly DisAbled Person…

I woke up this morning to some sad and shocking news. A good friend of mine died yesterday. One of the things we had in common was our disability, and so the news hit me hard. I’m not really sure whether I should be blogging about this, right now, or even ever. Some might say it’s too soon to write about such a thing, or even that something this private should not be shared with the Internet. But a very good writer once told me that when something bad happens to writers, they just sit and write.

Besides, when blogs were first invented, they were described as online diaries. Over the last three years, I have found this blog to be a very good listener. At times, I have written things here that no one in my offline life even knew. And this has always helped me. I’m hoping that it might help me again today.

As you know, my blog posts don’t usually come from personal experience. But I’ve always said that I think times like these are when disabled people need their blogs the most. So today I want to share with you the poem I’ve written in tribute to my friend, who I won’t name here. What I will say is that I’m thinking today of her family and of all the friends we share, and also of anyone else who has ever lost a friend to severe disability.

Another Gap In My List

There was a time when your smile, your love, your presence in my life

Filled a gap- the one left by someone else who left us too soon.

I never forgot him and I never will

But thanks to you, some of the space he left in my life was possible to fill.

So we shared some special moments

Some smiles after many tears

We shared some friends

And probably some enemies as well, over the years.

I said once to you that I never make the same mistake twice

And I’m so glad I didn’t.

That would have been too high a price to pay.

For what we have always shared, long before we knew each other

Is this disability that knew us both better than we knew ourselves.

There was a time when I used to say it was the best one to have because it didn’t, couldn’t, wouldn’t kill

Now I know only too well that it not only can but it will.

It’s this disability that today has taken you too soon

Leaving me with another gap in my list of friends.

I’m wondering today who will ever fill this gap

But one thing I know, as you watch me today

No doubt enjoying the view from the Moon

It’s not quite Mars- or maybe it is- we don’t know.

Anyway, the one thing I do know

Is that today I’ll make you the promise that I once made to our best friend-

I’ll be there for those you love the most, because, you know, I would have wanted you to say the same to me, if my life had been the first to end.