A Magical Evening

Imagine yourself on the fourth night of Hanukah in a large room with lots of Menorahs (or Hanukiot) on long tables. The candle holders are different shapes, sizes, colors and ages. Some have been around for years and passed down from generations and others are brand new and were just bought this year.  What I just described to you, was my first experience celebrating Hanukah at Oak Park Temple but they have been celebrating this way for 150 years . This year there were about 150 Menorahs brought by families and scattered throughout the sanctuary. The lights went out and the sight was magical!    When the lights in the room were on, all the menorahs looked different but when the lights went out, all we could see was the flickering lights on each of the 150 menorahs and we all chanted the blessings in unison. The lights were illuminated and we were all together as a community, celebrating the miracle of Hanukah. At the service the Rabbi talked about two universal messages. The first one is that everyone has a light in them and they might just need help finding it or letting it shine. It is our job as a community to help one another do so. The second one is that several times in our history, people were tempted to give up on each other but when they didn't, miracles would happen. 

When you think about light this holiday season, remember our ancestors and how they didn't give up. They always had a glimmer of hope. Finally, don't forget that you have an inner light to shine and share with the world. So as the lights of my menorah go out on the 8th night of Hanukah while celebrating with family and friends, I wish you a year of peace, love and happiness.
Write to you in 2015,
Jessi 

PS. I can't wait to participate in this tradition next year!  

Welcome to Walgreens and Welcome to My Life

I decided to wait a month to write again because I kept thinking of different ways to write about my experiences, but wasn’t happy with it. I was thankful for these opportunities but didn’t know how to say it. About a month or so ago, I was at my Walgreens job that I’ve had for almost 11 years now. Frankly, I felt like I was bored with it. You see, at my other jobs, I feel like I can make an impact on other people’s lives, but this one felt monotonous, until one day, when I said my usual greeting, “Welcome to Walgreens,” and the man replied, “Thank you, it feels good to be welcomed somewhere.” From that day forward, I have looked at my job differently. Though it is simple, I now believe that I am making a difference in people’s lives even if it’s just a little bit. 

Now, you’re probably wondering, why did I say “welcome to my life” as part of the tile of this post? I said this because I was at yoga class, and I had a breakthrough with my body. Something that I’ve been trying to do for years in dance finally clicked. This was a good lesson for me in not giving up on my body, because I believed I kind of did. I just thought that due to my disability, it’s something I could never train my body to do the proper way. So now, I feel like I am truly a part of me.

Something like this is a perfect example of how you’re never too old for a breakthrough, disability or not. I am proud to say that, because of this breakthrough, I can finally do a high release properly. How do I know that it’s right now? Number 1, my yoga teacher said that it was. Number 2 and more importantly, before he had even said it, I knew it was right because it felt right. Whenever you aren’t sure about something, just go with it because it might lead to a breakthrough, or to something that makes others happy. 

Your dedicated dancer and employee,

Jessi

Beyond Today

Hi Readers,
I know this is very rair for me to write two post in the month, but I came across two circumstances that I  thought were totally blog worthy, and they relate to each other. 
So here they are.
One day last week, Micheal's family who was my coach and friend for the first two years of me living on my own, brought some of his books to the lobby because they wanted to help keep his memory and legacy alive and most importantly his mission to help others with disabilities. 
To learn more about Michael, and his book go to my post and title Unforgotton Hero. 
It all started when my assistant went down for a break and said there were a bunch of books in the lobby in memory of Micheal. I decided to grab one for myself because mine was torn up. I was so happy it was like a gift was given to me. Once again and I felt like he was still apart of the building. Then a few days later, I got in a disagreement with someone at the purple pad. I was having a very difficult and stressful day, but then I thought of the books. What do I want to be remembered for?
Do I want to be remembered  as person who cannot express her needs?
Or do I want to be remembered as a eloquent speaker, who helps others?
Do I want to be remembered as someone who always complains about her day to day struggles?
Or do I want to be remembered as someone that shacks it off and keeps dancing?
What do I want my legacy to be?
Just these simple positive thoughts, made the whole rest of my week a lot better, and that got me thinking again, even Michael's spirit is talking to me and telling me, the appropriate direction to turn. 
This pass weekend, an example of legacy came up again. 
My brother and I were in a corn maze at an apple orchard. He was very helpful to me, and with him you never know whether he's going to be helpful or not. But it was very cool. It was like he didn't have a disability. He helped me through the narrow spots, without being frustrated or complaining to much. He took the leaves out of my chair when he noticed that they were getting stuck.When I told him Brian we need to slow down because my chair is stuck, he pushed me out right away without any hesitation. 
When my chair malfunctioned at the very end of the corn maze, he waited patiently for me to fix it before going on any further. The only time, he went ahead of me, during the maze was if there was an easier way for my chair to get through. 
He did this a couple of times, but each time, he returned with a smile and said okay I got this. The experience of the corn maze was something we will never forget. 
This is what I believe, my brother wants to be remembered for a kind, compassionate, person who likes a challenge and a bit of adventure. 
I hope that more people will get to see these sides of him because they are what make him very special to me.
This is what I believe he wants to be remembered for. 
So my question to you is: What do you want to be remembered for? What is your legacy?
Happy to be out of the corn maze, safe and sound at the purple pad.
Jessi

A Fresh Start

I took a month off writing because I've had alot of thoughts going on in my head, and I wanted to take a break to reflect on them before writing about them. 
In this post I will discuss different philosophy's that I have developed over the past year. As a result of me living on my own for six years .
The first one is "Never Break Tradition. 
For years and years, my friend Paula has been visiting me every summer and I have been going to her place every New Years. But this year, the week that she was suppose to come in, was the week after Tori moved out and things were just crazy. So I told her to come two weeks later, which was Labor Day weekend. I had everything planned out and things finally calmed down here, so I thought it would be perfect. But the Wednesday before, she was suppose to arrive the thing that locked me in the car, broke down and therefor that means I had to use the straps that normally lock her in when she is visiting. We were both devastated, but one day I had an idea. I was going to tell her, that she had a package coming on Saturday and she had to be home at a certain time to receive it. Then Saturday came along, and my car broke down. Shoot another conflict in my plans, but luckily we were able to fix it and I have a gullible enough friend, and she believes that packages come on Sunday, so when I told her that it would be a day late, she didn't even question it. Hour by hour, that day I was telling her from the car, how far away the package was and even though, my visit was not even for 24 hours, we were so thrilled to see each other and not break tradition. It was something we will never forget and a great way to end my year. 
I say My Year because when you are Jewish, you have two New Years, but the Jewish one is really not about partying it is about reflecting on the year as a whole and how you can make your life as well as other people's lives around you better. We talk alot about improving ourselves. And that is what made me come up with these philosophy's. 
My second philosophy, fits right into religion.
I'm not telling you what religion to be, or how to believe I'm just telling you that at the end of last year meaning December, I was really struggling to find meaning in my life. Everything felt scattered, like a bunch of puzzle pieces. I believe, I even wrote about them in another post and  realized that maybe going back to Synagogue would not necessarily give me the answers I needed, but give me strength. 
Since last December, even though this has been a difficult year for me, I notice that on the weeks that I go to Temple wether it is my new ethics class, or just plain services, I feel stronger and more together. I feel like it's easier to take on the week. 
My advise to you is to Find Something That Gives You Strength and Stick To It. 
My third philosophy is the hardest one yet and one that I would be working on all year to overcome. But with the spiritual strength, my love of dance, supportive Family and Friends I'm determined to make this one happen because it will make my whole life alot easier.
I am very grateful for what I have in my life, but when there is something going on, that I really don't agree with, it is hard for me to be grateful for what I have in my life while excepting what is. Each day I will examine the day and try to find away to make myself happy, to that I can except what is.
I know this won't happen overnight and that is why I'm giving myself a whole year to work on what right now seems like a overwhelming goal. 
If you have an overwhelming goal that you would like help with, I would be more than happy to help you as well because I know you will help me with mine. It is one of the hardest things that I have ever done, but I think now that I am 28 I am ready to take on this challenge. I also feel like I can take on this challenge because I was given the birthday of October 2nd, which is around the Jewish New Year which makes me feel like I have a double New Year. 
As Helen Keeler say's "Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much."
Much Love, Jessi 

Keep Going

My life has been nothing but crazy lately but the breaths in between have been amazing. Imagine yourself on a train or spinning around in a circle. Your eyes are closed and you feel so overwhelmed. You think, oh this is just temporary I hope. But day after day the same thing happens again, and more things keep testing you to see if you  can handle them. That is how my life has been lately. A little over two weeks ago, Tori my roommate found out that she is moving to Wisconsin. I am very happy for her that she is now following her dreams but she is not a room away from me, and I keep thinking she is going on a vacation and she is coming back in few days. I also have had a lot of assistance changes at the Purple Pad. At the very last minute, people have been having to fill in with not much training or notice, which has been very stressful for me. Also, each of them has different personalities, which is another reason why it has been so difficult. But it has taught me a lot about how you can’t always plan for everything in life. I have had assistants living on my own for almost six years now. But the abundance of people in personalities has just gotten to me this month. On top of it all, my little Teddy has had to go to my Mom’s house because of behavioral issues. So I hope one day, he can return to the Purple Pad. I think that is one of the reasons my life has been crazy. I’ve almost always had a dog to comfort me during difficult time and I don’t have it right now.

So it’s been nuts but in between all this craziness, I have enjoyed creating dances with my dance partner. We have created memories that I will never forget. Our relationship was just recently mentioned in the Oak Park newspaper. We are helping to teach the world that everyone can dance.

This has been a perfect month of really realizing the important things in life, like family because I had a lot of disagreements whether or not I should move to Oak Park because of my love for that community but then I have finally realized that I will be so far away from my family, and family is important. It is what keeps you strong and keeps you grounded.

Another breath or special memory I will never forget about this summer is reconnecting with my friend Annie. We met at the Dunkin workshop last summer and for whatever reason, I thought I would never see her again because she lives in Virginia, and I thought we would just be facebook friends until the end of time. But surprisingly or not, I saw that she had returned to the Humphrey workshop as well, and it was such a lovely surprise. So even though this month has been very difficult for me, I will always cherish the memories that have been created.  I know all of my readers have my back.  So my message to you is simply this, "no matter what obstacles you face, keep going" there is always a pot at the end of the rainbow. even if that pot is really far away. Thank you very much you are a big part of why I keep going.  To read the article I mentioned and another reason why I keep going please go to  http://www.oakpark.com/news/articles/7-29-2014/friends-and-neighbors:-integrated-dance/ and type in intergrated dance. love you all 
-jessi

Making Memories

As all of you know, on the Fourth of July, our Independence Day occurred. Part of discovering my independence was adapting to having assistants. I knew I needed assistants to live a successful life, but  I like to spend the Fourth of July with my family each year. This year, I went on a bike ride with my dad and then we met up with my brother and we went kayaking for the first time. My brother and I thought the experience was miraculous and then we had dinner with my mom and saw fireworks. It was a perfect way to celebrate the day. There are only a few  things  my brother really likes  so when he said I really liked kayaking, it was so relaxing. I was so happy to hear this.

Over the past few months, I have been struggling to find good assistants which unfortunately is nothing new. The good ones have helped, stepped up and have gone above and beyond what I could ask for. One of them is Tori, who you all know is my roommate. Tori will be leaving at the end of the month. Her playfulness is what makes her so good as an assistant and friend, along with her sense of commitment. I will miss her as being my roommate we have so many funny stories over the past two years that I couldn't count them if i tried.  the good news is that she will remain in my life. She will continue to be one of my assistants until further notice. I am grateful for this because we can continue to allow our friendship to grow.

Another thing I have discovered about my independence is that like any other twenty-seven year old, I have dreams, but sometimes these dreams do not come true immediately. I want to move to Oak Park because my dance and spiritual communities are there. As you grow up, you realize that what you want to happen does not always happen as fast as you want. But, when it does, I will be extremely thrilled because I will feel even that much more independent. Also, a few months ago in a previous post I talked about having some free time for myself and some time away from my assistant's. Ever since that entry, the time away from my assistants has been wonderful and made me feel that much more independent. I hope you all had a nice Fourth of July and remember, everyone has their own form of independence. 

-Jessi

P.S. -  For those of you who are wondering, when I move to Oak Park my room will still be purple. 

Follow Your Heart

In life, you are faced with choices, and when you are an adult sometimes it can be hard because your parents are not always there to help you decide what the right choice would be. They say when you are confused to follow your heart. This might sound cliché, but it was absolutely true for this month for me.

I was faced with two choices: 1. To go to camp 2. To dance. It might seem like a simple answer, but both of these things bring me comfort and enjoyment. After several days of contemplating the issue, and being concerned about what the right decision would be. I decided by the advice of one of my friends to give myself a day to think about it. I did, and I truly believe I gave myself a day to think about it. I not only did that, but I said to myself, “Do what your heart is telling you to do”.

And in this circumstance, my heart was telling me to dance. Even though I am not going to camp this summer, I will still be going to Fall Weekend, which is a weekened where I can spend time with some camp friends. You might say, “Jess, but you only get a chance to go to camp once a year, and you dance every week”. That was something I considered, too, but then I thought about how as a sit-down/wheelchair dancer, I do not get as many opportunities to perform as the stand-up dancers do. I knew my dance partner would be leaving for college in a few years and I didn’t know how many more opportunities we would have to spread the message of freedom of dance for all people with all abilities. 

So, that is why I believe my heart took over and told me to dance, because when I finally made my decision to perform this summer it was no longer coming from my head. My body just had an instinct telling me “You need to do this. This is an opportunity that you do not want to miss”.

I will be performing on July 19^th at the Disability Pride Parade downtown and at my dance studio in Oak Park, the Academy of Movement and Music on July 26^th and 27^th.

I don’t know how many other times I will get this strong feeling of urgency in my life, but my advice to you is…When and if you ever get a it, follow your heart, because if you don’t you may be missing out on experiences you wish you hadn’t!

-Jessi

P.S. - My friend Chava had her baby today! Mazel tov to her and her family and I know she will teach her daughter to follow her heart!