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Experience is not what happens to a man. It is what a man does with what happens to him. Aldous Huxley What if at age 46 you were burned beyond recognition in a terrible motorcycle accident, and then four years later were paralyzed from the waist down in an airplane crash? Then, can you imagine yourself becoming a millionaire, a respected public speaker, a happy newlywed and a successful business person? Can you see yourself going white water rafting? Sky diving? Running for political office? W. Mitchell has done all these things and more after two horrible accidents left his face a quilt of multicoloredskin grafts, his hands fingerless and his legs thin and motionless in a wheelchair. The 16 surgeries Mitchell endured after the motorcycle accident burned more than 65 percent of his body, left him unable to pick up a fork, dial a telephone or go to the bathroom without help. But Mitchell, a formerMarine, never believed he was defeated. "I am in charge of my own spaceship," he said. "It's my up, my down. I could choose to see this situation as a setback or a starting point." Six moths later he was piloting a plane again. Mitchell bought himself a Victorian home in Colorado, some real estate, a plane and a bar. Later he teamed up with two friends and co-founded a wood burning stove company that grew to be Vermont's second largest private employer. Noteskin grafts：植皮 Marine：水兵 real estate：房产 Then four years after the motorcycle accident, the plane Mitchell was piloting crashed back onto the runway during takeoff, crushing Mitchell's 12thoracic vertebrasand permanently paralyzing him from the waist down. "I wondered what the hell was happening to me. What did I do to deserve this?" | 
