Four reasons why thinking you have problems actually just means you’re a pussy
Every week, I take my domineering son Austin to swim lessons at our local overpriced health club, so that he can tempt death by repeatedly swimming out of the instructor’s reach. Austin is five, and he’s in the “Advanced Preschool” class. This means that he’s old enough to transition from sinking to occasionally remaining afloat, but not old enough that Robin and I are allowed to leave the area and unwind at all. It’s nature’s way of keeping parents tightly wound and on the verge of a killing spree.
While Austin’s class is going on, there’s also another group in the pool. One kid in that class always catches my eye. I’d guess he’s six or seven years old and he won’t sit still. He’s always running recklessly on the deck and hopping up and down in the little gutters that run around the the pool’s edge. His name is Logan, and I know this because the instructor is always saying, “Logan, SIT DOWN!” and “Logan, put that away!” or “Logan, climb off of that woman’s head!”
I noticed Logan in the pool because for a while, Austin took preschool gymnastics and Logan was in the class after his. We even attended some sort of a gymnastics show during this period, and Logan was part of it, jumping up to swing on the bars and tumbling on the balance beam.
This is all pretty pedestrian until you realize that the kid is blind. Which, by the way, you don’t realize until he leaves, when his mother hands him a long white cane with a red tip.
I am totally inspired by Logan.
I go through every day being able to see what’s in front of me and what’s around me. I make my living by looking at a screen all day. I take for granted that when I need something, I can drive my car to get it. When I get tired, I can be entertained passively by a TV or relatively passively by a book. I can quickly sort through clothes and see what I’d like to wear. I can see when my hair looks like a bird’s nest or when my fly is unzipped. I can watch my kids play.
Logan can’t do any of that, but here’s the thing: He doesn’t care. He’s not feeling sorry for himself. In fact, I’d wager that thanks to his mother, he doesn’t even know he has an obstacle.
You can see this by watching him, by the confident way he’ll ill-advisedly jump up and down on a wet pool deck in the same way my sighted kid will. You can tell by the way he’ll walk a balance beam without hesitating. He knows he’s different, sure, and I’m sure he knows a few alternate ways to be safe in the absence of sight. But his mother could have kept him out of the pool. She could have kept him out of gymnastics class.
You see this kid and you’re like, “Wow, I really don’t have obstacles in my life.” Because if you can watch Logan and still maintain that you have problems, you’re either dying of cancer or something, or, more likely, you’re just being a big wimpy dickbag.
See, “problems” are mostly objects of perception, not reality. And confidence and empowerment? Those are both choices.
Logan’s mother could have decided that he will grow up to live the life of “a blind man.” That would have had a certain base level of satisfaction. But instead, she made a different choice. She decided that he’s going to live the life of “a man, who happens to be blind.”
If you’re starting to feel like your sore back and your credit card debt are kind of minor problems, then good. They are.
I have this fantasy. When I’m really rich, I want to start some sort of a fund to award cash prizes to awesome people. People who are just living their lives, faced with what others might think is a huge challenge but which they themselves see as “just how it is.”
People without major ailments are constant victims of minutia. They will say, “I’m too young to do that. I’m too old. I’m too tall, too short, to dumb, too poor, too fat.” None of that is true. You hear about eighty-year-old women climbing mountains, and destitute people starting billion dollar businesses.
I want to start my awesomeness fund, and I want to catch people who simply were never told that they had a major handicap and were therefore supposed to give up on life.
If you think you can’t do something and feel like the weight of the world is on you, I have three things for you to watch — all of which are contenders for the Johnny B. Truant’s Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence.
1. Ben Underwood
If you think you can’t do something because of X, Y, Z, or Obama, WATCH THIS VIDEO. It is astonishing. Seriously. I’ll just sit here while you watch it and crap your pants in disbelief. Check out the trash can bit at the 1-minute mark. Then change those pants.
Serious kudos also go out to Ben’s mother, who was able to grow up with enough confidence to inspire her son while saddled with the hideous handicap of being named “Aquanetta.”
2. Lazy Legs
I can’t stand that show America’s Got Talent, but that’s where the world met this kid. He can’t walk unaided. He’s got those wrist-bracelet crutches that most able-bodied people see and immediately think, “Oh, wow, that guy is fucked.” If he were “normal,” he’d maybe walk when he could but would spend a lot of time on a Rascal scooter. But instead, he gave himself a nickname that accentuates his difference — and check out the shit he’s able to do.
Unfortunately, Lazy Legs was eliminated from America’s Got Talent early-on and a singing ventriloquist went on to win the season, proving once and for all that this country is — demonstrably and definitely, through thick and thin and without question — utterly fucked.
3. Kyle Maynard
This guy was born with no arms and no legs but I’d seriously bet that he could kick your ass, and then steal your girlfriend. Seriously. Like, I think I may even want to make out with him.
Most people get a deep cut on their finger and decide they can’t type for the day, so they go home. Or they’re rejected for a job or cut from a team and they give up on their dream of success. You know what we call that in a world with Kyle Maynard? We call it being a lame-ass douchebag. Stop feeling sorry for yourself, you lame-ass douchebag.
The next time you come up with a reason why something can’t be done, just ask yourself if you’re ever going to win JBT’s awesomeness award with that attitude, you big pussy.
