This week is the final post of a three-part series. Be sure to check out ARC Days and Seeds if you missed them.

The director (the one that originally recommended the Columbus State program to me) at ARC South hired me on as a habilitation assistant!  I WAS SO INCREDIBLY HAPPY!  Going from being a participant to being on staff was totally awesome!

My day would start out with bus duty, which meant helping the individuals get into the building. Some of them could walk and all I had to do was hold their hand.  Others, were in wheelchairs, so I learned to drive my scooter with one hand and push a wheelchair with the other.  I really liked doing bus duty except there was one little incline getting into the door that was really hard to push wheelchairs up!  No problem, someone would usually come to my rescue and help me! 

In the morning, after bus duty, I would take one or two of the individuals to listen to the radio in a dimly lit room and that was the perfect setting for me to get one more hour of good sleep!  Wait, stop! Did I really type that?  What I meant to say was that I could do some really deep thinking and get my day organized. It just happened to work a lot better with my eyes closed for some strange reason! If any of you can help shed some light on the reason I did better with my eyes closed, please let me know! ha ha ha ha 

One funny thing about this was, it was dark in there and there wasn’t a clock, not that I could have seen it anyway.  We were supposed to be in there an hour, 8-9 am.  Once I was done with my deep thinking and getting my day organized (wink, wink) I would decide it was time to go, and I would look at the clock right outside the door and I would be so surprised. I don’t know how I did it, but it would usually be right around 9 o’clock. Today, typing this, I think God was helping me not get fired and He gave me the gumption to rise up and go! 

There was a three-wheeled bicycle built for two and I would take people for rides! I discovered a nice loop around the inside of the workshop that made a great bicycle route! Some days I would have several people waiting their turn to go for a ride!  I felt like I was running a regular taxi service! I liked to keep busy!  I hated dull moments with nothing to do!

It was surprising (and troubling) that not everyone who works in the field is tolerant and understanding of disabled people!  There was an individual at ARC South who couldn’t talk, so he would make a lot of noise and it would be loud, but it was his way of communicating.  I would hate not to be able to talk and I would make some noise any way I could! His supervisor asked me to come take him out and push him around in his wheelchair for an hour every day to give her a break from him.  She seemed to be a little harsh with him and a little mean at times, so I would do it more to give HIM a break from HER! People, we are all going to get old one day and getting old sometimes can be quite disabling!  How do you want to be treated if/when you become disabled?  These days it seems most of the world has forgotten the Golden Rule, “TREAT OTHERS AS YOU WOULD LIKE THEM TO TREAT YOU”!  Sometimes, I just want to shout at the top of my lungs, “DISABLED PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE TOO AND HAVE EMOTIONS AND  FEELINGS JUST LIKE EVERYONE ELSE AND DESERVE TO BE TREATED LIKE EVERYONE ELSE!!!!” 

Let me say that there are a lot of people in the field who do really care about disabled people and do an awesome job!  I have been the benefactor of people in this category! To all those people out there reading this right now, I would like to say a GREAT BIG THANK YOU! 

When ARC South closed, I was transferred to ARC West.  Fortunately, I got to follow my very good friend, who had been so good to me all the years I was an employee and who supervised my internship at ARC South.  We both got transferred to ARC West together as staff.  It was at ARC West that I spent most of my years working as a habilitation assistant and really found my niche! 

I’ve learned over the years that if I wait for someone to tell me what to do, I might never do anything. I had to just jump on in and take the initiative.  Bus duty at ARC West was a lot easier because there were no inclines at all; everything was nice and flat. It was very fun finding myself doing all the things that every other staff was doing. 

My personal goal every day was to go to work and help make the days fun, nice and pleasant for the people I worked with! I saw a lot of sad situations and most of the people in workshops live in group homes!  I wanted people to know that I really cared about and loved them!  God had given me a ministry and I wanted to do it well! One of the very first women I started out working with was very nice and sweet!  I had a variety of activities that I would do with people!

One of the first activities I started out doing with the people was mosaic picture kits.  It was important to me to help the people make things look as professional as they could look, at least the part I did to contribute to the particular project we were working on at the time!  Don’t worry, I would let them do it how they wanted!  I spent many fun weekends going to Hobby Lobby to get activity supplies for the week!  Managers at ARC would tell me that they would buy my supplies, just tell them what I needed.  No, I like to buy in BULK!  In my opinion, three is good but six is even better!  I wanted to be able to buy what I wanted and how much I wanted! 

I had fun thinking up ways to work with the people to get the job done!  For the mosaic pictures, I would get a little ruler, place the mosaic piece on the tip of the ruler, position the mosaic piece over the correct space where it went on the board  and then let the person I was working with press it onto the board. 

I would also do “sand art” with them.  I would get clear plastic bottles of all different shapes and sizes and fill them up with different colors of sand. Of course, it was important to me to have equal amounts of the colored sand.  Guess how I tried to achieve that result? Measuring spoons! Are you all wondering how we got the sand from the measuring spoon into the bottle?  A wonderful tool called a funnel.  I would let the person I was working with measure out the sand and pour it into the bottle.  And I want you to be assured that yes, we did level the sand in the measuring spoon before we poured it into the bottle! I had fun doing sand art and many days I would think of myself as a mad chemist!  My family could tell what I had been doing any particular day!  I would come home with mosaic pieces and sand all over my clothes and scooter! 

I also would read to a blind woman.  One of the most important things I learned from doing this is, DO NOT READ HUCKLEBERRY FINN OUT LOUD IN PUBLIC! It really has some very colorful language that definitely IS NOT APPROPRIATE for that setting!  I started reading it, but then I told myself that Mr. Rogers would probably not read this in his neighborhood, so I won’t either! 

I took some people for walks, pushing them in their wheelchairs.  One woman would laugh and get a kick out of running into things or people so I would purposely pretend to run into things (sometimes I wasn’t pretending, it was for real, but she still would laugh- so it was all good!  Right?)  Other people would walk beside me holding my hand or just walk beside me. 

I want to tell you about one more thing that was totally amazing and awesome!  I met three beautiful, Christian women and whenever it worked out, we would get together and read a devotion and pray.  They also became totally awesome friends who could help keep me grounded on tough days! 

Well, I could go on and on with this post but as the saying goes, “All good things must come to an end”!

Thank you all for traveling this journey through my ARC Days! It’s been fun reliving it! ARC Days took up my life for many, many years, and took me through many stages:

1. Being a client /participant. To me, I was an employee, getting to do one of my dream jobs, being a cashier!  

2. Going to college and graduating! 

3. Going from client/participant to being on staff!  Ending my work career with the best job I ever had! 

I loved the job and God equipped me to do it well!  I encourage you, if there is something that you want to do but you’re not sure you could do it, go for it and try! Don’t automatically assume it is just a dream that could never happen!  Remember me/you/we plus God are a winning team!  Don’t put limits on God! Remember, WITH GOD ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE!