The bully in the parking lot - what an impoverished emotional life he must have. He does not need to fear going to hell, he already lives there, and it is a hell he created for himself.

Nan,
A re-enactment of your close encounter with the wrong kind in the parking lot would make an excellent YouTube. Whoever is going to watch over this should start a "YouTube Channel", so all the videos chosen and accepted as relevant could be posted, in addition to new series of videos, all on one channel.
Your parking lot bully - maybe safest thing was to stay away from confrontation, as you did. Let him go home and beat his wife and kick his dog and spew hatred at his neighbors. No use putting yourself in danger with a scumbag like that.
But if there is no danger of you getting attacked physically, I find it easier to hand out cards than to talk - they are the size of business cards and can be home-printed on your computer - and this is a re-post so I am hogging bandwidth again - but I want Nan to see this:
Cards for Parkinson’s patients to hand out in the street and during conversations, as many as required, depending on the situation.

The cards say:

“Heavily drugged, wants to dance.”

“I have Parkinson’s. WTF is your excuse?”

“Wanna snort some Mirapex, baby?”

“Not inebriated. Please get me some booze”

“Come with me to Vegas.”

“No known cause, no known cure. A lot like you.”

“Part of my brain is dead, and it was my favorite part.”

“Your tax dollars at work.”

“Parkinson’s: $200 million a year research; nothing new in 60 years. Just give us the money and bugger off.”

“I was okay until I met you.”

“They are doing experiments on me. Are you one of them?”

“Mind-blowing.”

“Who to sue? Who to sue?”

“When you hear sizzling and smoke comes out your ears, you’ve got what I’ve got.”

“I have trouble undressing myself. Want to be a good citizen?”

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

“I call myself a spastic. What do you call yourself?”

“When I fall down, I am just practising for my sky-diving classes.”

“The Parkinson’s Underground Internet Conspiracy – rich, powerful, stoned on levodopa, and coming to your neighborhood sooner than you think.”

“Don’t drink the water. It’s in the water.”

“There, but for the grace of God… no, wait a minute.”

“And to think that I used to vote Liberal.”

“So just exactly what are you afraid of?”

"Seen any sabre tooth tigers recently?"

“At least it teaches me a lot about you.”

“They will stamp you, and they will label you. Like they do with pants and shirts.”

“We will soon be a majority. Things will change.”

“We are pretending to have Parkinson’s, just like Michael J. Fox.”

“We can’t dance, the experts say. But we are awfully good stuntmen and body doubles.”

ANY MORE QUESTIONS, MISTER?

ANY MORE QUESTIONS?

I'm afraid if I reenacted it, all those bad words would come spouting out of my mouth. But if it would help, I would do it. I'm sure that part of the reason for my emotional response to this incident is that I feel that I'm doing so well (and I am most of the time), that it's hard to cope when it slaps me in the face that I'm not.

Bob, your replies helped a lot. Many thanks. A tear and a chuckle and I'm back on my bike. It's his problem for being an sob, not mine for having PD.

where do you live? im in port orchard

speaking of the hope conference.. i have been to three of them. i know bill bell personally (nwpf) maybe one of the break out sessions could be us. start small, see where it goes.

Nan, I'm so sorry that this happened to you. Please don't diminish this awful experience. You were the target of a bully's verbal abuse. In spite of that adage about sticks and stones, words DO hurt. And yet you demonstrated great restraint, grace and dignity in the way you responded to this miserable person. Take care of yourself.

Lindy and all,

When I first entered the advocacy scene, I was told that orgs would steal your ideas and not acknowledge you. There has been some improvement in the relationships between patients and orgs. But lindy,in this age of videoconferencing ..there is NO excuse good enough to not involve knowledgeable patients. They probably know more than the decision-making businesssmen and women with the money. We should be included in research from start to finish. Trials would be far easier to fill because:

Ptients would be completely honest and the most objective. We have no agenda or nothing to gain except to feel better.

Patients would have all the information with which to recruit. Speculation can kill a clinical trial.

Patients understand the role of humanness that is lacking in trials; they understand the importance of compassion and could make doctors aware of physical or emotional discomforts that doctors ignore.

Where there is exclusion, there could be deceit, and, unfortunately, this is usually the case. It will remain so if we are silent.