I walk to most places now.
It’s strange to not have to think about curb cuts, wheelchair-accessible bathrooms, and making sure that the nurse at my doctor’s office moves everything out of the way so I can back my powerchair into the room without bashing into things.
It’s strange to have to hunt around for chairs to sit down in. Because just because I can walk, doesn’t mean I can stand indefinitely. In fact, standing has always been harder than walking. My cane helps signal to people that if I need to sit down, I need to sit down fast.
I am sure that the way I look to people has changed, but I have not yet been able to work out how. In the past, I remember how people’s estimation of my cognitive abilities went up once I was in a powerchair full-time. Because apparently I have some quality of my appearance that usually makes people underestimate me cognitively, but if I’m in a wheelchair, they can blame that quality on a physical impairment. Now that I’m out of the chair, I wonder if I’ll be getting treated like a two-year-old more often again. Or if enough has changed, that that won’t happen either.
I may be walking places, but my identity has not caught up with the idea of being a walking person. I still imagine that I’m in a wheelchair. Of course, I’m not fully out of the wheelchair, either. I still use wheelchairs for distances I can’t manage yet. But when I do walk, I still somehow imagine that I’m in a wheelchair, and I’m always surprised to find that I’m not. Everything looks different when I walk, it’s all viewed from a different angle in more ways than one. I’m still not used to it.
It’s not just a matter of identity, it’s a matter of perspective. Literally the angles are different. The places I can go are different. The expectations I get from others are different, and not always what you’d expect.
And I feel like I haven’t quite caught up yet.
I also feel like very little about me has actually changed, and yet other people see a huge change because the categories of full time power chair user and person who walks with a cane and may sometimes use a manual wheelchair are so different in their minds. The equipment you use becomes how they see you, even other disabled people do this.
Ballastexistenz 
it is more than true; perception is the reality in a person’s mind, accurate or not. You have experienced some extremes and have the talent to articulate that experience. Race, gender, age, mobility aids, attire…i have conducted some experiments of my own and get some radically different engagement from people i know and don’t know. Only one word describes it and that is ‘un-evolved’. I hope you will write more about this new mode of mobility for you as it is a huge impass for me. I should have a scooter or powerchair for long distances, but i resist with all my being as i am terrified that my cognative value will plummet. It isolating for me, as a farmer (of sorts) to need wheels to navigate my little farm. Plainly, it feels defeatest. Please write more as you have the where with all.
That reminds me of a post that you wrote a while ago about you and a friend in a waiting room in your wheelchairs, joking about her staff being seating-impaired.