When I wrote Help is More than Getting the Job Done in the ‘Spinning My Wheels’ category, I was talking specifically about the help we with disabilities are given to achieve a goal; in that post, it was getting my hair french braided. But really, the concept of respectful help,  most often for me, applies to getting into a business, store, restaurant, or building inaccessible to people who use wheelchairs. So many times, I have heard, ‘oh, we can get you in there.’ But that enthusiasm leaves me with a void in my gut. ‘Well, yah,’ I want to say, ‘I’m sure you can. But where’s the dignity in that for me?’ I am a person, not a bushel of hay fit to be hauled to my destination. But it’s easy to overlook a need for dignity in logistics, and I usually just went along with it and didn’t take it as disrespect or anything. But a friend once offered to take me to Hawaii and blew up at me for inquiring about its accessibility. That was unreasonable. Anyway, the simplicity of getting into or around within a place is easy to take for granted, but it is a small triumph that makes all the difference, for me anyway.

Please see my post Bare Naked Help in the ‘Spinning My Wheels’ category.