Beautiful People--post 3

I am struck by the number of Beautiful People I have met since arriving Panama. I see them daily at physical therapy and every other day at the hospital. They are not the exceptionally attractive local Latin Americans. They are the very people that I use to keep my distance from because I thought I could not relate. Today I find myself looking forward to our daily greetings. These are people whose bodies have terribly failed them. Either through an accident or by some internal malfunction their bodies have failed. Their arms or legs may be contorted. The tilt of their head may not be quite right but they are now beautiful to me! You see I am now one of these people. It was as I was laying on the physical therapy platform it finally dawned on me that I was one of them. as someone else was manipulate my arms and my legs in order to move. I am uncertain why it has taken me so long to come to this realization and to the realization of just how beautiful these people are.

We talk to each other in the waiting room's, we lay beside each other in physical therapy.. We get to know each other and look forward to seeing each other. These are people like you and me with stories of life, with hopes and dreams and children and grandchildren. The exception is that their stories have been interrupted by something that they never thought would happen to them. Most of these Beautiful People know that nothing short of Heaven will fully restore them but they hold out hope for some improvement. So the next time you see one of us approaching in a wheelchair don't look away. When you smile or say hello it makes us feel just a little more normal. It might also help you to think "here comes another Beautiful Person"!