In his recent religious memoir, Ian Cron described how his schoolmates had segregated themselves in the Greenwich (Conn.) High School student center, a memory unclouded by the decades since. The preppies, “drama-club types and marching band kids,” jocks, smokers and “the kids who thought they were above … the social food chain” all had their spots.

“The stoners loitered by the doors that led to the science wing,” Cron wrote. “The kids in wheelchairs, the lost souls with oozing acne, the students in special programs who drooled or talked to themselves, and anyone deemed freakish had their own area as well. We avoided it. No teenager wants to see someone whose outside looks like the person they feel themselves to be on the inside.”

What Cron says rings true to me: The reason most of us are uncomfortable around people with disabilities is that we want to keep our own frailty at a distance. And, yet, I know that the opposite can also be true: People with perceived weakness can show us strengths we didn’t know we had.

This is one of the founding beliefs of a local nonprofit called Reality Ministries, and it’s why I feel blessed to help them raise money at a benefit concert later this month. You see, I have had this experience myself. It was one of my first visits to the Reality Center, at 916 Lamond Ave., at the corner of Gregson Street behind Durham School of the Arts.

The office administrator, Julie Watson, whom I would later marry, had invited me to the annual Kings and Queens Dance three years ago. Every spring, this gala gathers dozens of kids from Reality’s “Real Friends” program, a weekly event that brings disabled teens together for pizza, games and singing. A volunteer or staff person always stands up at the end with a message of love and acceptance. At one end of the center’s all-purpose room, a giant banner says, “I AM FOR YOU.”

It seems the message is heard, because the kids will tell you that Reality is their favorite place in the world, and that sense of belonging shows itself at the Kings and Queens Dance. These teens -- with their genetic disorders and birth defects and features the world has decided are “ugly” – these kids dress to the nines: tuxedos, ball gowns, corsages and, of course, dancing shoes. Etched in my mind is the image of one young man, DeCarlo, with his thumbs under the lapels of his tux jacket, strutting to the catcalls of his sharply dressed friends. Minutes later, he was among a crowd of some 50 strong, their feet moving, arms reaching high, all smiles and laughter. DeCarlo likes to hold hands and take “prom” photos with everybody.

I won’t pretend to know what a person with a disability feels like on the inside. But when I watched the Real Friends on the dance floor, I saw freedom. Maybe if you’re used to strange looks everywhere you go, then eventually you start not to care what other people think. Or maybe the Reality Center has cultivated such an atmosphere of acceptance, you know your Real Friends are going to love you even if you trip over your own feet and sprawl out on the floor. Either way, this wallflower felt a little silly not dancing, when everyone else seemed to be having such a good time.

It’s not often I have this feeling, that I must dance. Only one other time I can recall, just this summer. (Maybe I’m getting older and realizing that life is too short not to dance). I was at the Wild Goose Festival at Shakori Hills in June, and The Collection, a folk-pop band from Greensboro, had just started their set. There were 14 of them playing guitars, mandolin, glockenspiel, horns, strings, keyboards – like a gypsy orchestra with shout-along choruses that exploded with joy.

“I had thought that I could change the whole world with my songs, but I can’t even make my mind up,” sang David Wimbish on one song, but then on another: “I’ll leave the [words] that sound like love ’cause they must have come from heaven above.” And the whole band, with a big, joyous gang vocal, just kept repeating those words: “They must have come from heaven above! Yeah, they must have come from heaven above! Yeah, they must have come from heaven above …”

That’s what it felt like to dance with dozens of other people under a big white tent while The Collection played, and that’s what it felt like to dance with the Real Friends – like it must have come from heaven above. And on Saturday, Aug. 18, at 2 p.m., maybe I’ll get to do both, because David Wimbish and The Collection are headlining a benefit show for Reality at Motorco Music Hall. The suggested donation is $5, and every dollar will be doubled through a matching grant. You should come. You don’t have to dance, but you’ll probably want to.

For more information, visit realityministriesinc.org/.