The ugly side of retirement

It's been a while since I've wrote on here. Partily because nothing that funny or great has happened to me to tell about and partly because I've been really sick at times to even think of funny shit to write. Anyways, retirement can cause the ugly side of a man to come out. I mean this is a very real way!  Since I no longer work I have not trimmed my beard in 4 months, got my lip pierced, and got my arm almost fully sleeved with old school style designs. Just picture this in your head. A fat guy in a wheelchair with a scruffy nappy beard with a lip ring barely visible because of the beard and a huge tattoo of a half naked woman holding guns and more guns on the other side and a ribbon that says "momma's boy". I know what you're thinking, this guy is a hot mess right?  Well this is what happens when you have no one to impress anymore. Since I no longer work and I've decided I'm never going to find a good woman, I have no reason to worry with how I look.

Totally different topic now but I've had several people who haved asked what makes me the gimp that I am. I really wish I had some badass story such as I was a vet in war and survived a bomb blast or that I was some extreme athlete who got hurt doing what I loved but in all reality I've been disabled all my life so I don't really know what being truly able bodied is all about. I was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy when I was 4 years old. For the first few years of life it wasn't that noticeable. I could never run as fast as the other kids and was always a little weaker and slower in any sports or physical activities in school. I stilled played basketball and baseball from 2nd-6th grade, but I was WAY slower at running and very weak at swinging the bat or shooting the ball. I didn't realize it at the time but looking back now this was probably some of the most important steps in my life that my mom pushed me to do. Once I entered high school in 7th grade I joined the marching band and stayed in it till I graduated. These were some very tough years in my life. I started to show more signs of weakness and because I knew I was different I tried to fit in with all the groups in school. This led me to getting into trouble and getting arrested at just 15 years old.  By the time I graduated I had really started to develop a very noticeable limp in my walk and my posture was so bad that my rib cage stuck out and made me look like I had tits. The harassment and cruelty I received on a daily basis towards the end of high school and up to the next 2 years later had led me to hate life. I basically became a hermit and did nothing but go to work and come home and sit in my room.  I was ashamed of my life and hated everything about it. I never fit in with any of the "cool" groups in school and felt like I didn't fit into society at all after I graduated. I hated life, was ashamed of my looks and my disability, was so shy I never even dated because I never could meet one (I still struggle with the girl thing to this day). By this point you're all probably either feeling bad for me or thinking I need to just get over it. Well, with the help of one very awesome friend I got over it for sure. It wasn't all by choice but I am the person I am today thanks to this one person. I don't want to put his name on here so i will just call him Beard. Beard and I have been best friends since we were 4 years old and met in head start. We played pee wee basketball together and remained friends kind of on and off through high school. After high school beard went off to college and this is when I had become a hermit and basically hit rock bottom. I was fired from my job and had nothing to look forward to in life. I was so embarrassed about my disability that I didn't dare go out in public for fear of being made fun of or worse. Well Beard had got into some trouble while off at college so he moved back home to get away from all of that. He wanted to keep going to school though and decided that I should go with him. How he convinced me to sign up I will never know, but it was the start of a whole new life for me.

So Beard and I start attending community college in January of 2001 and man what a change it was. Beard knew I had these problems and he decided to take it upon himself to fix me. It was bad enough that I was now going out in public around thousands of people close to my age and felt like they were all looking at me but Beard though I needed more attention. From then on he tried to embarrass me in every way possible. From making fart noises and blaming me, running outside towards me calling my name like a retard, just saying off the wall shit to any girl who sat by us and so on. If he though it would bother me he would do it. It is because of all the harassment from him that I finally realized that it doesn't matter what anyone thinks of me and that I needed to be ok with who I was. A couple years later I went to a wheelchair full time and never slowed down or looked back on life. I have made some of the best friends a guy could have and got out and done anything I wanted to. The only thing that he didn't help with and even to this day I still struggle is with girls. I freeze up and just shut down inside. Eventually I'm cool with them if they talk to me,but I've never been able to pursue a girl for say dating. Usually I become the nice friend that they all don't wanna hurt.

Well I think I've went off on about three different subjects, but most of this has been typed while under the influence of lots of pain meds so you will have to forgive me

Your awesome gimp,
Tim