The Man in the Chair

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I was at a doctor's appointment a few weeks back. It was a normal appointment. I checked-in, sat in a chair in a non-descript waiting area and counted the minutes until my name was called. The process is not unlike what maybe you've experienced.

My visit coinsided with the 2012 Olympics. This is an important part of this story.

As I sat and waited for my eyes to dilate, I witness something that entranced me. A man sitting in a wheelchair.

I know that on the face of it, seeing a man in a wheelchair is not strange. I would agree with that. But this man was bright, alert and Engaged with the sport being played out on the screen in front of us in the waiting room. Stay with me.

The man in the chair was someone I noticed when I arrived at my appointment. He was hunched over and almost catatonic. He seemed to be a man alive, yet without life. At first glance I felt a level of sadness at the reality of struggling in the last act of living. Fast forward, I see him watching an Olympic competition and fully engaged. It was if someone woke him from the dead.

It was clear to me that this man in the chair found something worth coming alive for. I offer no definitive explanations. He saw something, maybe something lost.

The sad reality is I see people half the age of that man who look the same, but without a wheelchair. Alive, yet dead. Call me extreme and I will tell you to look around (really look around) and see the following:

  • An overly medicated population
  • A sedentary population
  • A surrendered population
  • An unhappy population
  • A population unable to resist 

I'm not pesimistic and I don't belive things can't be turned around. I'm trying to shake you with what I've seen. Maybe the man in the chair would say we need somthing to cheer for, be for, fight for.