Here's the thing: disability is loneliness. It is isolation not just in illness and alikeness, but in solid, tangible fact. It is solitary confinement. Friends stay for a while. They offer their help. They are kind. They hope for the best. But when the best never happens, when the need goes on and on and on, they disappear. It is not a flaw in them. It is a human thing. No one can help out 24/7. No one can be there and understand and fill that well. There is no way to be less alone. There's nowhere to place blame for that.
I interact more with the mailman and the pizza guy than I do with anyone else. I'm too tired to cook. My legs ache. I see a human face while I fill in a tip and sign a receipt and ask for peppers and cheese. It's worth twenty dollars, right? I can make the pizza last three days, and three days of meals plus a human face and a human voice is worth twenty dollars.
I'm glued to my computer or my phone. Too many people complain that technology separates us. Satirical cartoons show people staring at phones instead of talking. There isn't anyone to talk to anyway. My friends live on my computer or my phone. Just past another screen there is a whole life out there and I just need to consume it, but I can't really. Second hand is good enough for now. Maybe someday it won't be second hand. Maybe someday I'll find a town where the buses don't suck and I'm not too tired and I'll make some friends and I'll do stuff that doesn't involve staring at a screen to see what everyone else is doing. Oh god.
Someday I'll find a way to repay and be useful and pay everyone back for every time they've helped. Right now I can only apologize for my uselessness. I am sorry. I'm sorry and I'm lonely and I wish I weren't this thing. I wish I could be the friend you all deserve and I wish I didn't need so much or have to ask for anything. I'm sorry.
