“I’m going downstairs for ice. You want anything, Gimpy?” my co-worker, H. asked me as I came in. I had my cane today.

“What did you just call her?” N asked, a little alarmed.

“Oh, I said it affectionately!” H. shot back. Like I said before, I don’t pay H. any mind because I really think that the thing in her head that would ordinarily tell her that she doesn’t know me well enough to tease me that way has somehow gotten switched off. She talks that way to everybody.

“I’ll take some ice too, please.” I said. “That’s not the worst thing anybody said to me today.”

Not by a long shot.

I did manage to get some sleep last night, but this morning I had that “shaky” feeling in my limbs. I sometimes get that when I’ve had the first few chiropractic adjustments. It’s a little unpleasant, but not in any way debilitating. It’s just kind of a muscle weakness that comes from the joints being set in proper alignment and thereby asking my muscles to do something different than what they were doing. Still, I would have liked nothing better than to just sit on the sofa with the dog and the birds and watch a DVD.

But, I volunteer at the Humane Society on Thursdays, or, at least I tried to. One week I missed because I was on vacation. Another week I didn’t go because of the heat. It’s easy to think of excuses: I didn’t want to be like that.

So, I picked up my cane and went. “Hi, how are you today?” I asked as I came in the door and put my pocketbook where I’d been told to put it the time before.

The boss looked at me. “You’re not going to walk dogs with that cane. What are you going to do here today?” she asked flatly.

I’m used to this. People see the cane and assume that you can’t do anything. So I said quietly, “No, I didn’t think I would be able to walk dogs today. I’d be happy to do any filing or other paperwork you’d like me to do, or I could work with the cats.”

“We don’t have any paperwork, and we’re not doing that with the cats any more. Hold on.” She said crossly, and went to answer the phone.

I sat down. Okay, this is why some people work with animals, I reminded myself, they may not come across so well to people. Lets see what happens. I sat there and watched the doves in the cage. They’ve been there for weeks and weeks.

Eventually, she got off the phone and came over to me. “Look, we really don’t have appropriate for you to do today. Why don’t you come back when whatever your problem is gets better?”

“Appropriate? …My problem isn’t going to get better. It’s liable to get worse. I’ve had the same problem the whole time I’ve been volunteering here. It’s chronic.”

“I never saw you have a cane before!”

“I don’t need it every day. But I bring it to be responsible, if I feel I need extra support to keep from falling. If I’m going to volunteer here there’ll be some days I bring my cane and some days I don’t.” I said all of this quietly and calmly, by way of explanation, in order to help her understand.

Never, ever, did it dawn on me, until that moment that I would not be allowed to give my time to an organization, even if I were on my walker, or God forbid, in a wheelchair. For someone who has been through as much as I have, and has seen so much ugliness at times, I can still be incredibly naïve. Or maybe just stupid.

The look on her face said it all. She was as shocked by my statement as I was by hers. I hadn’t seen that look on anybody’s face in years, since when I had to wear my back brace 23 hours a day. Not only did she not want to work with me, she didn’t want to have to talk to me or even look at me. “ But we have to be careful! There’s liability! Nikki! Nikki! Can you please explain – this is Tea, one of our newest volunteers – can you explain why she can’t work with the cats?”

So the executive director thought the whole issue was about me working with cats, because she had just come in the door, and that’s what the managing director ( or whatever she is) told her. Nikki explained to me very patiently about their new cat policy, of which I was already aware. Specifically, they don’t want people to go from cat to cat to cat because it spreads germs among them, and the cats have been much healthier since they started that policy. I waited for her to wind down, I was about to explain that I’d work with the birds, rabbits, guinea pigs….the iguana if it was still there, or do any paperwork they wanted.

“…I don’t know if there’s any filing, which maybe you could do….”

“There’s not” the first woman said, again with the same flat affect.

“Nikki, can you take a call? It’s Mrs. L, that woman in the wheelchair who’s suing us because of that fall on our property –“

Great timing, Mrs. L! I thought bitterly.

“Yes, I’ll take it.”

“I’m sure there’s something she could do. Goody bags? No she’d have to stand on her feet?” Someone said. Of course, nobody asked me if I could or could not stand on my feet. It was like I was no longer there. This happens to, sometimes, but it’s never happened in a situation where I was there to help other people out!

“Surely,” someone else said, “Just one cat could benefit from being socialized. She could just work with one cat today….”

That caught a sharp look. Maybe there was internal disagreement about the cat policy. Maybe not. Suddenly, I didn’t care any more. I stood up and got my handbag. “That’s all right. Look. My purpose in coming up here was to be a help, not a problem. Don’t worry about it.”

I turned and walked out. “We’ll see you later!” the woman with the “just one cat” suggestion called after me. I could tell she knew how I was perceiving the situation. No you won’t, I thought. If you think I’m going to go through this again, you’re crazy.

I try, very hard, not to cry in front of people. And I didn’t. I waited until I was in the car. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt that hurt and that humiliated. It’s such a bad feeling to make such an effort to offer people the best you have to give and have it be rejected.

“That’s the fault of some GD lawyers!” The Hub said when I told him what happened. My mom said the same thing. He and my mom always say the same thing. It’s weird.

But I told both of them “No it’s not”. There wasn’t a lawyer in sight up there, and if that woman had really honestly been concerned about liability, she could have asked me to sign a waiver. I don’t know what it was really about. Whatever it is, it’s her problem not mine, but I still don’t feel like dealing with it. I suppose I could write her a letter. Maybe I should. But if she wasn’t hearing what I was saying in person why would she hear what I was saying in writing? Moreover this woman is in her 50’s or 60’s. She’s lived in a world with people a lot more disabled than me for a long time – it’s not my job to educate her or change her mind. Why should I have to put up with her? Maybe I should try to, for the sake of the dogs, but I guess they have plenty of volunteers like the young women who were up there who have to fulfill their volunteer hours to graduate from high school.

All that intellectual reasoning aside, though, emotionally it made me feel very small and worthless. Sometimes I really hate living in this County.