So this event happened a week ago. After a day out shopping I came home to find a street near my home, a main street, which also happens to have a cemetery on, had the pavements almost completely blocked by cars. As you can see in the video, I found crossing the road at the crossing very risky due to a car actually being parked on the crossing. So I attempted to go down the street, passing all the cars while doing as little damage as possible, to the point where I couldn’t. This pooh was a pole. A normal obstacle on the pavement that without the cars wouldn’t have caused an obstruction to me, but it did. So I had to turn back, and attempt getting back passed the cars without causing any more damage to the cars or damaging my chair. I then attempted the crossing despite the risk.

As I have said, the street is very near to my home and I know it well. Therefore I know that going the other direction would not only have taken roughly 20minutes to get back to the same position on the other side of the road, but would have also posed it’s own dangers to me. I don’t often used that side of the road, until after the crossing that I attempted to cross at, apart from when the bus drops off there.

I know my usual routes well, for a reason. It’s a necessity of existing in this inacessible world. Were I to go back up the road on the side I was on, I would be going against my usual routes. One route that I did that I did know, as it is part of a different route for a different task, was to go down that road. As I attempted to. My back up plan was blocked.

I was able to deal with this situation with the help of my sister, but I am really not sure this is something I could have dealt with on my own. I found this a very overwhelming situation.

Now at the time I posted this to my social media platforms, and while I had a lot of support, many people were insisting that I had to give the people leway as this was clearly an important event. A funeral. And while I recognise that, and I did at the time. I had to remind everyone that I am still disabled when life events happen.

Another interesting note is that a funeral took place today, and the pavements weren’t blocked. So this isn’t an excuse to block pavements, the blocking of pavements does not happen every time a funeral takes place. It is not a necessary and unavoidable part of a funeral. It is simply careless, and not thinking of others.

Others still matter, regardless of the event. I am still disabled regardless of the fact that this is someones funeral.

As a disabled person, I am always the one expected to be aware of others situation. As if I am always in the way I should try to limit the impact I have on other people. This translates to me not wanting to be in other peoples way, which is something I subconsciously try to do in my daily life. I am now actively trying to do the opposite.

To me, accepting that the rest of the world has valid reasons such as funerals to not include me, is purpetuating ablesim. And I don’t expect the world to change around me. But I’m done being quite about the fact that it won’t.

I deserve to exist. I deserve my place in this word. And I deserve access to the rest of the word, regardless of what is going on within it. I deserve to matter.

I deserve to be able to go out, without risking my safety and on this occasion possibly my life, to simply get home again.