By Billie Brown

It’s not a role I ever planned for, but a couple of Mondays ago, I sat in a courtroom in Milledgeville, the seat of Baldwin County, Georgia, and agreed to take legal responsibility for another human being. It happened so gradually and painlessly that when asked if I was willing to accept the guardianship, I almost told the judge no. Panicking, I searched my memory: how did I get here, what does this mean? It certainly scares the daylights out of me, this guardian thing, but I must add that it is also (already) bringing me a certain measure of happiness.

I should mention that my protégée, if that’s the word, has more than her share of issues. Multiple congenital impairments confine her to a wheelchair and severely limit her mobility. At thirty-two years old, she is a high school graduate but reads at about a third-grade level. There is nothing, however, wrong with that razor-sharp mind of hers or her sassy take on the world, which she observes from a place of distant, dry irony.

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