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[driving]
It feels just incredible to be on the road again.
I've been pretty isolated for 8 years, since this car crunched me,
too busy just trying to survive.
I went from being so brain damaged I couldn't count change
to finishing a master's degree,
but this ain't exactly your inspirational cripple story.
Part of the fun of being brain damaged is you're constantly having to argue
there is, in fact, something wrong.
People see the limp, but they don't see the loss of memory,
the judgment problems, the going to the bathroom 37 times a night,
the difficulty swallowing, the abandonment, and isolation.
Here I'm going to Chicago for this gathering of disabled people.
There are 43 million of us in this country, but we're as invisible as Casper the ghost.
I'd only known a few other disabled people in Minnesota,
so nothing prepared me for what I was about to walk into.
(street sounds, metal moving along street)
[policeman] No, no, you can't go back there. You have no personal attendant.
No, for your own safety. You can't go back there.
>> Why is that?
>> For your own safety, for his own safety.
>> Well, my safety is my own choice.
[people yelling] Stay away! Nursing homes!
>> Staff wouldn't stay there! Down with the nursing homes!
>> Like everybody else, I thought disabled folks were supposed to act tragic but brave,
or else cute and inspirational.
>> Down with nursing home.
>> But these folks weren't sticking to the script.
The people watching were shocked that these kids were so-o-o angry.
But that was how come I knew we were in the same club.
[people shouting] The people united will never be defeated.
>> Chicago was the first time I knew I wasn't alone.
[rock music]
I stopped my scooter at a stop sign and the car behind me didn't.
It threw me 67 feet.
It's a good thing I a helmet in the trunk in case I needed it.
[rock music]
>> Can you feel what's happening here tonight, Billy?
It's for you. We love you.
So I'm lying in the hospital unconscious when they decide to have this big benefit for me.
It was a sellout.
>> We love you. We miss you. Get well soon.
[rock music]
>> I'd been on the radio with a rock -n- roll show the Walks and Kills.
I'd been in the scene for years, so the benefit is jammed with 1,500 people,
all telling me I'm their best friend.
>> It' me! Wake up, will you?
>> I feel like I'm the only person in Minneapolis who hasn't met you yet.
[rock music]
>> You'd think all I got to do is wake up from the coma, and everything is cool, right?
Wrong.
When I came home from the hospital, my body and spirit were broken.
[car door opening]
I was brain damaged, and I'd lost partial use of my left arm and leg.
The doctors were talking to mom about a nursing home for the rest of my life.
I went from gallons of people around me to nobody there in a couple of months.
The best job I could think of was selling pencils at the bus station.
Things did not look good for the home team.
[rock music] [When Billy Broke His Head ...And Other Tales of Wonder