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cosmolinguistI am drastically underslept, I had a horrible nightmare and dragged myself out of it to, yay a world where nothing bad has happened to my dog (I gave him extra cheese and paid him extra attention this morning just because I was so happy that nothing bad had happened to him) but, boo, it was five o'clock in the goddam morning.
I didn't get back to sleep. I did get a stomachache. I really don't want to go to work but I'm already going to miss my other "long day" this week so at one point lying awake in bed I was wondering how I could make myself okay with working and...
...then I remembered I can start getting the bus to work today. We talked about it, this was the plan.
So that's how I, notorious hater of buses -- so much so that it made me an official volunteer campaigner to get bus drivers to treat blind people better -- ended up in tears at the thought of being able to get a bus today.
Tears of, admittedly, sleep deprivation and long-standing stress. But also of relief and gratitude, honestly.
(Also tears of frustration, that governments made choices that allowed things to get this bad and stay this bad so I haven't been on a bus in 14 months and some people won't even be able to feel as safe as I do now for goddam years yet. I'm torn between "who the fuck am I to be relatively safe, I'm no better than the people suffering more, why should I have what they don't?" and then pulling back from my own depressive mode to my favorite thing: policy. Why should any of us be suffering unnecessarily like this.)
I didn't get back to sleep. I did get a stomachache. I really don't want to go to work but I'm already going to miss my other "long day" this week so at one point lying awake in bed I was wondering how I could make myself okay with working and...
...then I remembered I can start getting the bus to work today. We talked about it, this was the plan.
So that's how I, notorious hater of buses -- so much so that it made me an official volunteer campaigner to get bus drivers to treat blind people better -- ended up in tears at the thought of being able to get a bus today.
Tears of, admittedly, sleep deprivation and long-standing stress. But also of relief and gratitude, honestly.
(Also tears of frustration, that governments made choices that allowed things to get this bad and stay this bad so I haven't been on a bus in 14 months and some people won't even be able to feel as safe as I do now for goddam years yet. I'm torn between "who the fuck am I to be relatively safe, I'm no better than the people suffering more, why should I have what they don't?" and then pulling back from my own depressive mode to my favorite thing: policy. Why should any of us be suffering unnecessarily like this.)
(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 08:09 am (UTC)While EVERYONE deserves to be vaccinated ASAP, there are two excellent reasons for you to be towards the front of the vaccine queue
1. you regularly provide in person care/support to a Disabled person - being vaccinated keeps the person you provide care to safe
1a. Being vaccinated also means the Disabled person you provide care/support to won't be suddenly left in the lurch without support because you are sick with COVID
2. As a Blind person, you have to touch the world much more than a sighted person, and it's also much harder for you to stay 1.5 metres away from strangers, both of which put you more at risk
2a. As a Blind person, you are more vulnerable to ableist care-rationing policies by over whelmed hospitals - UK hospitals have been rationing access to eg oxygen and ventilators, prioritizing nonDisabled COVID patients over Disabled COVID patients
You have NOTHING to feel guilty about ^_^
(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 08:58 am (UTC)I'm not even guilty exactly, just sad and angry about a lot of public-health national-government level stuff that has been left for us as individuals to think about and manage and deal with as best we can, with only whatever tools we personally have to assess risk or mitigate consequences, trying to factor in that we are surrounded by people who are at best doing the same and quite possibly less concerned about all this than we are.
I'm feeling totally inadequate to this because I am, this shouldn't be a responsibility we shoulder as individuals.
(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 02:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 08:38 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 02:47 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 08:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 08:17 pm (UTC)(boo that you don't have an AtW award paying for taxis but I wouldn't wish those fuckers on anyone atm, they're about to get to level 3 of the Natalya fuckery scale)
I'm glad real Gary was OK and got extra loves from you this morning. Bad dreams need to go in the bin.
I hope the bus drivers were good to you today (or I'll have to set Internet fire to things).
(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 08:38 pm (UTC)The buses are much easier to get and more frequent from where I live now, and I had no trouble getting the bus to work, but at the end of a long workday I did have one ignore me, my white cane, and my outstretched hand. It's much easier to laugh at these things when you can expect another bus in ten minutes, like I can now (it was 30-60 minutes before). Apparently some things don't change even after a pandemic! I'll have to get my "kicking Stagecoach up the bum" activism back into gear again now!
I've been told their latest excuse for not stopping is that the buses are covid-full but those have been asked to put up the "not in service" sign and I did see a couple like that so didn't expect them to stop for me, but I did expect the bus with its normal number to stop, and the first one didn't!
(no subject)
Date: 2021-05-10 09:40 pm (UTC)I am so pleased your new house is better for buses, that is good news. But boo to bullshit driving past you. I don't buy their covid full rules for a second, if they saw you with cane, they could stop and tell you that as well as rely on a visual indicator...
I hope you can find spoons for Stagecoach but not beat yourself up if the spoons and tuits aren't there either.