Yesterday I got to meet the governor. I got to speak up about TBI, and He gave me his honorary signing pen. I was there with the BIUA for his signing of a document acknowledging March to be Brain Injury Awareness month or something like that. To be honest I do not totally understand what is was all about and so far it has not been covered on any news sights that I have seen which is a bit disheartening to me.
But I want to share a tender moment.
When the governor and his mini paparazzi came over to me because I had offered to answer his question (when all the PhD holders froze or were trying to compose their answers) I got a bit nervous and forgot what I was going to say. A deer in the headlights for a split second, but I was able to utilize my TBI blunt honesty and humor to state, "I'm sorry, I just got a little of nervous and forgot what I was going to say. Can you please repeat the question to help me remember?" or something to that effect.
But in that moment I started to feel shaky and shy, I felt a hand on my arm and a soothing rub on my back.
My sweet friend Renée was there and she jumped right into action helping me to quickly regain calm and composure.
This is the beauty of what organizations like the BIUA and people like Renée do. They help you find your strength again. They want to build people and they want to find them help. They are a very small, understaffed and very likely underfunded organization, but they keep going and they keep trying to help people. They do all the little things they possibly can do and though they may be few they are mighty fine people and I am so very grateful for the the help they have given me.
I wish that I were bigger and could help them to become bigger.
Then there is my cousin I stayed with the other night. She inspires me to do and be better all of the time. The challenges and traumas she has risen above are astounding. She is a miracle to me.
In our conversation she told me she is always shocked at how many people seem to find pleasure in seeing her fail. She says she fails all the time and fails hard, for example she has been training and working hard to make it to the Olympics in boxing. She barely missed the cut for the last time and she has had to close the door on that dream. She said that is hard, but she is idealistic and she recognizes the good that has come from it and moves on. But, like I mentioned, she is always shocked at how people will find pleasure in her failure.
I was so surprised to hear this from her. She is so easy to love, so kind and never have I heard her even come close to tearing somebody down. She builds people up and yet people still want to tear her down. We had an enlightening conversation about this and I was so glad to hear about this because I know the feeling and it hurts and sucks, but now I know I am not alone and it is not just in my head. She is younger than I and many years ago I was more in the mentor role but now I very much look up to her. I am so impressed with how she handles the put downs and knock downs. I am not so strong and I allow them to affect me too much.
So I find I am especially grateful for her and Renée and the many other people that may play very small roles in my life but that build me up instead of tearing me down.
I am glad these two and others are still in my life, still checking up on me, and still believing in me, it has renewed my spirit at a time when I was beginning to let some jading happen and not so nice things were starting to slip from my mouth.
Though there is a whole lot of mess in our world there is still so much good and so many amazing people.
No comments:
Post a Comment