Thursday, April 26, 2012

Stress Relief


Don't expect any terrific thoughts or profound pontification for this post. I'm just dancing away at The Airstrip on Lesbos for a bit of stress relief. Today was a long, hard endurance trek as I attended to my mother's needs while she had some out-patient surgery. As events unfolded they became worse than expected so everyone's stress increased proportionately. Fortunately, she wasn't at the local hospital where the incompetence is usually so high that I'm often the one to change her dressings, fetch and empty bed pans, and provide meals. We merely had to deal with bad news following bad news all followed by more bad news until a solution was found.

At various points during the day I did wonder how my SL wife was doing (Finals week at her Uni), why Friendly's restaurants are closing left and right (I was gonna get a treat there at lunch), and if folks might consider designing doctor offices in Second Life so they could see if the @#$%^ doors were conveniently situated for wheelchair access. Mom's new wheelchair, while expertly pushed by me today, managed to get almost as many scrapes as I did trying to maneuver through what amounted to an obstacle course. You'd think medical facilities would be more friendly to the differently-abled. The vestibule at one place was barely able to accommodate just the chair, let alone the chair and me. I had to hold open one door with my leg while opening the next and push mom along just to get into the building.

And that makes me think that everyone should check out the Resource Center at the Cape Able Art Gallery (SLurl) and Virtual Ability Island (SLurl) in Second Life. If more people did then perhaps more places in Real Life would try to accommodate the differently-abled, people chronic illnesses, and psychological challenges.

No comments: