A Special Saturday

 

I love Saturdays, but some Saturdays are more special than others. 

Take this past Saturday for example. Despite getting rained on my way to the St. Lawrence Market, I was very cheerful and upbeat and met many nice customers too. After the Market I went to Global Pets to pick up cat food for my three babies. 

However ,things started to become almost ridiculously fantastic when I had left a Rexall store in which I had been browsing. Suddenly, out of the blue, this good looking man handed me $20! I smiled at him in gratitude. I’m not proud, I’ll take any money that people offer me. However, physically it was impossible for me to put the money into my Fanny pack and it was difficult to drive my wheelchair away with a fresh new bill in my hand too. The guy, upon seeing my predicament, came up to me again and asked if he could help me in any way.  Thankfully, he understood when I gestured to my Fanny pack that I needed to put the cash into my wallet. I pointed to my communication board and said “Thank you” - he understood and smiled at me as I drove away! Our brief interaction made me even more happy than the money he gave me, because he saw me as a person. Plus, he was hot! 

I met my friend Janet and my employee/friend at The Spaghetti Factory for dinner. It wasn’t too crowed so  we got a table within 10 minutes. Having been a customer for 50 years, all of the restaurant staff knew me and greeted me graciously. 

The three of us sat at a table and started ordering our meals. Suddenly, this guy in a Toronto Maple Leafs sweatshirt came over and plopped down $150 onto our table, saying that he wanted to treat us to dinner! Of course, we said Thank you for his kind offer and accepted his donation. 

He chatted with us for a while, telling us about his daughter who had CP, like I do, but, sadly, she had passed away when she was nine years old. I told him I understood his pain, because my husband Rob had died 14 years ago. With my iPad, I showed him my paintings of Rob, as well as my other artwork. When he saw my painting “Feelings Of Invisibility”, he offered to commission me to do a remake for $500. Of course, I said yes! 

What a day! I love meeting kind and generous people, who also see me as a person. I wish everybody in the world could act with such kindness and empathy. 

Catching Up on What’s Been Happening

Yes, I know, I’ve been a bad blogger. Shame on me for not writing as often as I should!  It’s just that 2024, so far, has been incredibly busy for me.  Good things… and not so good things have happening to me.

First, the City of Toronto asked me to give a speech to a group of social workers, recounting the experiences of my life. They all seemed to enjoy my talk  -  oh, yes, and they got to watch Feelings of Invisibility, too, which they loved!

The day before this happened, though, I was filmed in a new TV show, produced by the CBC, caller #thesqueakywheel  -  an amazing, hilarious new series, where all of the cast and crew have different types of disabilities.  Please watch it when it debuts in a couple of months time!

I still love to paint, and I keep getting more commissions for paintings.  However, because of snow and rain storms, I wasn’t able to go to the St Lawrence Market for two weeks.

The three not so good things that are happening in my life are:

1). My rent might triple because of a new City of Toronto law.

2)  My whole apartment was totally flooded last Saturday when I came home from the market.

3) Both of my feet and calves have been sore and swollen for over a month.  My doctor said that she thinks I might have a blood clot.  There are no hospitals accepting patients who need Doppler X-rays until April 23, though.

I am panic stricken.