This week a colleague shared the meaning of his “tag line.” It was a heart stopping conversation.
His brother has been a quadriplegic since his early twenties after a freak fall. Having worked in rehabilitation, I was curious about his story.
He married a woman with cerebral palsy knowing they would not have long together. Given she too was confined to a wheel chair, their primary connection was face to face conversation.
Most relationships are enriched and complicated by differences of values, where we live, work, social engagements, travel, sex, sports, health, intellectual stimulation, attraction, family issues, etc. We make it about all of that! These two made it work within the confines of full bodied presence to one another.
For work, he makes websites for people with disabilities through use of voice command technology. Sometimes in the process he gets bedsores and the only way he can heal is through laying flat for weeks at a time, being turned frequently.
One day, his brother asked him, how do you do it? How do you lay there for hours doing nothing?
He replied, “It’s what I must do to live.”
This amazing man could be complaining and, instead, finds the resiliency to encourage others by frequently saying, “Make it a great day!”
My friend stated, “He’s always reminding me…” “This is why it’s my tag line.”
What grace at work!