Laurie White’s Blog

Yes, I did see 3 more health professionals today, but is that really news? I’ll get to the gory details in a later post.

My big news is that I have a handicapped parking permit! No fuss, no hassle and I think I jumped ahead of 10 people in the DMV line to get it. (I think I was at the “special needs” line, while they were in the “driver’s license” line…I had an I number–I913, while they all had B numbers, like B234.)

The bad news is the doctor had to check a box explaining why I needed the permit. Instead of the “Is so ambulatory disabled that he or she cannot walk 200 feet without stopping to rest,” he checked the “Cannot walk with the use of assistance from a brace, a cane, a crutch, another person, a prosthetic device, a wheelchair, or other assistive device” box. My, this chemo may be interesting.

(Also intersting, one of the boxes is “Is a blind individual…” Not too disturbing ’til you realize you need a driver’s license to get the permit.)

I really don’t intend to use the permit anywhere other than at school when chemo sessions leave me tired, where there’s a lovely line of unused handicapped spaces a minute’s walk from my office. As a friend said, “You’ll have better things to spend your energy on.”

But oh, what a test of character! On the drive home, I kept trying to remember the wording of an old saying related to this. The Internet is great…I found it in just minutes once I got home and greeted the beasties. I wasn’t surprised to see it attributed to Piet Hein:

Yes, he was tempted, and he fell,
but judge him not too hard.
It does take character to sell
elastic by the yard.