I arrived at the furniture store around 11:45 last Sunday morning. I am in the market for a new recliner. A recliner is not just something in which to relax while watching the television for me – it is as essential to my life as breath itself. I can’t walk. I can’t stand up without assistance, either from a device like a walker or from another human being. So, if I am not in bed, I am in my recliner. If I am taking a shower, I am seated on a piece of medical equipment called a shower chair. If I am relieving myself, obviously I do so by sitting on the toilet. Even for number one. Every waking hour of every day is spent seated. If I’m not showering or using the toilet, that means I am in my recliner.
And if I go outside my apartment, I do so in a wheelchair, seated. Something strange happens when you sit in a wheelchair: you are no longer visible to other human beings. It is quite remarkable really. It’s like you are a Romulan from Star Trek with their famed “cloaking device,” a bit of stealth technology that rendered their warships invisible, an advantage in interstellar warfare but not in furniture shopping.
A friend of mine who drives for Uber took me to the furniture store and agreed to push me in my wheelchair – technically, called a “transport chair” (at left), because someone has to grab hold of its handles and roll me around as opposed to a wheelchair which is self-propelled, either by a powered motor or by two large wheels on either side with hand rails that can be used to manually roll the wheels in any given direction.
I was already paying Tony his standard Uber rate for the 20-minute ride to the furniture store, and told him I’d throw in an extra $15 bucks if he’d push me around once we got there. He was happy to oblige.
When we arrived and passed through the front doors, something like seven salespeople were milling about just inside, each holding an electronic tablet in their hand, like a pride of lions gathered around a watering hole on the savannah waiting for prey. One walked up to us, dressed in white pants (after Labor Day!) and a fluorescent green silk shirt that made him look like a bongo player at some beachside nightspot in Barbados. He held out his hand – TO TONY – for a handshake and said, “I’m Bob, what can I help you with today?”
Tony shook his hand and said, glancing down at me as he did, “this is Matt, he’s shopping for a new recliner.” I added, “one of those ‘lift recliners’ where you push a button and it helps you get up.” Bob smiled and bade Tony to follow him. He did, pushing me along in front of him. We arrived at what was clearly the recliner section of the showroom, and Bob said, TO TONY, “was there something specific you had in mind?”
I replied, “yes, I want a ‘lift recliner.’ I narrowed it down to two I found on your website.” Bob grunted and grimaced. He said, “oh, the lifts are over here,” and headed off to another section of the store. Hmm, I thought I’d made that clear at the outset. Oh well, no matter.
We arrived at our new destination, and Tony asked Bob, “do you have a restroom?” Bob motioned toward the other side of the store, and Tony headed off in that direction. Bob turned away from me and started scrolling on his phone. I said to Bob, “I liked one called ‘Crestmeade’ and one called ‘Next-Gen DuraPella,’ show me those please.” Bob did not even look up from his phone; he said, “don’t you want to wait for your friend?”
Okay, I see what is going on.
I’ll admit, I changed my tone a bit, like a prosecutor who gets permission from the judge to treat a witness as “hostile” (I watch a lot of Law & Order); I snapped back, meaning no disrespect to Uber drivers and/or my friend, “NO! I am the customer, he is just an Uber driver.” At about that moment, Tony returned. Bob showed us the two recliners I’d mentioned, then said, TO TONY, “go ahead, try them out.”
Oh for fuck’s sake!
Tony, for his part, started to realize what was going on. He helped me to my feet so I could try the first recliner, then the second. All things considered (function, style, fabric, sturdiness – I’m fat!, and of course price) I decided I liked the Next-Gen DuraPella best, and said, while seated in it, “I’ll take this one.”
Bob started tapping away on his tablet, and then looked over TO TONY and said, “if I could just get your home address Tony to calculate the delivery charge.”
This was not just an isolated incident with a rude and insensitive salesperson. This is the sort of thing that happens with frightening regularity when you live your life seated. Wheelchair users are disregarded, dismissed, and overlooked. I’m no psychologist or expert on the ins and outs of human interaction, but I have come to believe it is some kind of “dominance” thing; wheelchair users are not at eye-level, and so we are looked down upon, literally. Having relied on a wheelchair to get around for eighteen years now, I find this sort of interaction humiliating and dehumanizing, but I do not find it surprising.
And I am not alone. Fellow disabled person and wheelchair user Rebekah Taussig writes about the very same thing in her book Sitting Pretty, as does Allyson Buck about her disabled, wheelchair-using son at the Scary Mommy website.
To put it as plainly as I can, this is what ableism looks like. And as bigotries go, it is right up there with racism and sexism, to name but two. You don’t have to hate to be a bigot, you don’t even have to be hostile. Anytime you regard, speak of, or interact with another person as anything less than your equal, you are guilty of this kind of soft bigotry. I say “soft” because while Bob didn’t punch me in the face or burn a cross on my front lawn, he hurt me.
As we got in Tony’s car for the ride home, he said, “I thought you handled that well.” That comment meant the world to me, because it told me he saw what was going on too – it’s not just me being overly sensitive or bitter because I’m wheelchair-bound.
At the end of the day, Bob’s getting his commission and I’m getting my new recliner in two weeks. All’s well that ends well, right? I suppose. I didn’t set out to change the world last Sunday, just to buy a new recliner – and I accomplished that. Here it is…
But this was not a “no harm no foul” experience. And so I implore you, I am begging you: do not ignore those of us in wheelchairs. It hurts as much as a punch in the face.