Vertical Embrace

Refreshed Blog

As I look ahead to everything we’re building this year, I’ve decided to go back to the beginning. Every now and again, alongside our new community posts, I’ll be refreshing some of my “classic” writings—pieces I wrote years ago that still speak to the core of the advocacy life today.We start with a question I get asked more than almost any other: “Can you stand up?”

It’s time to answer that once and for all. The answer is both “yes” and “no.”I can bear my own weight, which creates the illusion of standing. But in reality, I am a balance act; I can tip over the second I’m placed in that position. I can only stand semi-independently if I’m holding onto a grab bar or something similar. Eventually, my arms will give out, and I’ll be on the floor until someone picks me up.When I say I am “bearing my weight,” I mean my muscles are doing the work of sustaining my body mass. I just need someone there to stabilize the frame. It doesn’t take specialized medical skill to help me—it just takes practice and the confidence to realize that we aren’t going to drop each other.

The ironic thing is that many people in my life have never seen me do this. I usually save it for transfers or therapy. But the most important reason I stand isn’t for exercise. It’s because it puts me in the perfect position to do something I can’t do from my chair: give a real hug.

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Philippians 4:Because

I am always in a seated position, I can’t easily give the people I love a gentle, chest-to-chest embrace. I usually have to wait for them to come down to my level. Most people know me in two ways: either as the loudmouth, obnoxious joker, or the constant professional looking for the next advocacy opportunity. They are so used to the “Seated Kevin” that they don’t even consider the “Standing Kevin.”The look of shock—and sometimes horror—I get when I ask, “Can you stand me up so I can give you a hug?”

Never gets old. Sometimes I don’t even ask because I can sense their discomfort.But I’m sharing this now because we live in a world where simple, human affection is often frowned upon or treated as something “wrong.” The truth is, so many people are starving for simple human contact. There are so many people I’ve wanted to hug over the years but never did because the world was too afraid of the mechanics to see the man.I’m done hiding the “trays” of my life. If you see me this year, don’t be afraid of standing. Be ready for the embrace.

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