By Dean Kramer

January, 2010

I am happier than I can ever remember being. I met someone and we seem to be falling in love. I am amazed that this has happened at all, but what is most breath-taking is that she so easily and naturally accepts my being disabled.
 
We met online.  She lives in Germany and I live in the USA. She speaks English well and my German has been improving daily. We began corresponding with email and soon progressed to telephone calls as we became more interested in each other.

But before we met in person, I thought it best , despite my anxiety, to describe my disability to her.
 
Her response was to tell me that when you really love someone it doesn’t matter that they use a wheelchair and, besides, one never knows when they are going to become disabled themselves, and besides, disability is not a reason to forego or to end a relationship, or to leave a person you love. She said, “If you were not disabled when we met, and later became disabled, I would not leave you.”

In November she came to Cripple Creek  and we spent several wonderful days together. I used whatever mobility equipment I needed wherever we went. She offered help, very unobtrusively, and accepted my responses, whatever they were. We completely enjoyed our time together. Occasionally I asked her whether or not she was comfortable with my being disabled. Each time I asked she wanted to know whether I was comfortable; tired, in pain, or sad. And as a result, not once in her company did I feel… um… disabled.

I felt graceful, attractive, charming, funny, and interesting which are also the qualities I attribute to her.  It isn’t that she doesn’t recognize that I’m disabled. It’s obvious that I am, and she isn’t in denial. It isn’t that she doesn’t care that I’m disabled. She cares very much for my feelings. But, for her my disability is just one part of the whole of me. Without dividing me into desirable and less desirable aspects. she simply loves the whole of me.

Though at present, we can get together in person only a few times each year, we are both nearing retirement when we will have more freedom to travel. In the meantime we make use of the telephone, email, and text messaging.  The distance gives us the opportunity to get acquainted slowly and without immediate enmeshment.

In 2001 I wrote about wishing there was more romance in my life. I also wrote about finding contentment without romance in my life. I did not expect to fall in love almost 10 years later. And, with my degree of disability, I certainly did not expect to be so completely loved in return. It seems unbelievable to me, or as they say in German, unglaublich.
 
During her visit I said, wistfully, that I wished we could go dancing together. I said that I thought perhaps we could simply stand together, in each other’s arms, swaying to the music. She agreed that was  a possibility.

Then she smiled and told me about a couple she had once seen dancing together in Germany. One of them was in a wheelchair. Together the dancers propelled themselves, including the chair, in a way that was graceful, romantic, and musical. She suggested we might want to try it that way sometime. Unglaublich!