Hello everyone-there have been so many posts lately that I have wanted
to respond to but I seem to have come to a crossroads lately. While it
would really make me happy to sit in my jammies all day & play on my
computer, I have had to make the tough decision to make the effort each
day to get up off my butt, get presentable and go out and face the
world-even if it is just a trip out to the grocery store or out to lunch
or up to a school function-for
precisely the reasons Jeanette has mentioned. I have had the publicity
in my little town of Chillicothe, IL., to become somewhat of a "big fish
in a small pond." And I feel that with the celebrity must also come the
responsability to be out there daily showing the world (or my little
corner of it), the face of early onset PD. I can understand as my
disease progresses (I use a cane or wheelchair now-& letmetellya-it the
brightest, funkiest cane I could find!), how it can rob you of your self
confidence & your self-esteem to the point that it is much easier to
become a non-enity, alone in the house all day, and just to fade away.
Some days it just ain't worth the effort, I think, but then I realize
that this is how we build awareness-one person at a time.
Also, I wanted to update you on the progress of  "The BooK"-which has
undergone a name change: it is now entitled "Voices from the Parking
Lot-Parkinson's Stories" and it is dedicated to our personal hero-Mr.
Don McKinley and the lovely Vivian. We are still looking for a
high-profile PWP to write a paragraph or two as an introduction, but
otherwise we are moving forward & hope to have more concrete news for
all of you contributors. I'm sorry to have kept you dangeling but I have
been waiting for something more concrete to report...and also to have
Dennis Greene back amongst us again! Margaret Tuchman, thanks for your
inspiration, always. I also wanted to mention that Stan (my much better
half) & my 12yr old daughter Allison are out hitting a bucket of balls
for Payne-he will be sorely missed at our house!
--
Joan E. Snyder    48/10
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"Ideologies separate us. Dreams and anguish bring us together."
              - Eugene Ionesco