The group of children laughed as they passed Johnny, a tow-headed little blonde sitting in his wheelchair. Johnny was nine, and he had been through a lot in his short life. He was adopted as a baby after he had come to America from Germany, and when he was a year he became very sick with meningitis and now had resulting physical and mental deficits. And, to add insult to injury, he was also diagnosed with muscular dystrophy at about the time he was learning to walk. At first, Johnny could walk with little problem, but as he grew older, his muscles became weaker, and he needed to wear braces on his legs and use crutches; and he would oftentimes fall down, especially if he grew tired.
Because of his obvious physical disabilities, Johnny often felt that others were staring at him or were pointing fingers in his direction. Too many times other children would laugh at his braced legs, the bulky wheelchair, or the crutches placed in the back of the wheelchair; they often didn't understand why the little boy couldn't walk a lot of the time, and they felt that he was nothing but a hindrance, especially when it came to playing games in gym or when it came time to change classes during the school period. Too many times he needed extra help, and people often considered Johnny as being something of a nuisance.
Johnny was a shy boy, anyway; he felt more so because of the fact that he WAS handicapped. If it wasn't for the fact that he had muscular dystrophy, he also had to worry about his having dyslexia (reading was just SO HARD for him at times!), epilepsy (he sometimes fell out of his wheelchair as he went into a seizure; he had anywhere from 2 to 5 seizures a week, even though he was on medication), and his vision/hearing problems. He had to use books that had large printing so he could see the words, and he wore hearing aids in his ears; without them, he couldn't hardly hear at all.
Too many times in the past kids made fun of him; they jeered as they pointed their fingers at him and called him horrible names; and the memory of those times still stung and still caused tears to well up in his blue eyes. Today he felt alone, and he still wished that he was still going to the same school his sister, Ronee', was; at least there she could defend him somehow...
Now he was at a school for multiply disabled children like himself, but even at this school, he felt somewhat out of place.
True, he wasn't as disabled as some of the children at Morningside, but he still had his problems, and each time they went on a field trip, able-bodied children would stare; and the stares brought a sense of dread to Johnny. It made him uncomfortable, and he didn't like to be stared at; he felt like he was a bug in a child's collection, and he didn't like that feeling AT all.
He wished that he was at the same school that Jose Varquez, his buddy, attended; there, at least, he felt safe; here, he still felt alone and scared; he felt that he didn't belong at a school like Morningside Academy; he was afraid that he would become as disabled as some of the more severely disabled students, students who needed help with getting dressed, eating, even going to the bathroon (and some of the children were NOT toilet-trained; they wore diapers)...
And despite his handicaps, he was better off than a lot of the students, and he wanted to make friends, but he wasn't sure of how to go about it, especially since he was still so shy. He decided to talk to his parents about it, to see if they could offer him any helpful advice.
Which is what he did.
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Reviewed by lana hobbs
9/23/2002
Hi Karen, I've been reading your work and I think it's great. I think you are a beautiful person with a heart of gold. I read your biography and find that we have some things in common other than writing. I was born in 1959 too and am also a twin. Keep up the good work. God bless you,
Lana H.
