Rayna,
    You wrote "My parents would also volunteer to sell raffle tickets for
the Crippled Children's Society, and then make me go out and sell those.  I
hated that worse than any thing else. ...it was just an 'acceptable' form of
begging..."

    I was spared this particular form of social torture.  I firmly believe
that one of the nicest gifts my parents gave me was a childhood completely
free of disability fund raising and poster child duties!
    By the way, I love your sense of humor!
        Susan (39,MSW, from New Jersey USA, spastic quad CP, still walking
on crutches, but finding the wheelchair web sites more tempting every day!)