BONNI SUE HICKSON is seen zipping around Loyalton in her power chair. Bonni Sue has Multiple Sclerosis, an inflammatory disease in which the insulating covers of nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord are damaged. This damage disrupts the ability of parts of the nervous system to communicate, resulting in a wide range of signs and symptoms, including physical, mental, and sometimes psychiatric problems. But she hasn’t let it stop her. Bonni Sue was honored as the 1985 Disabled and Outstanding employee of NV and inducted into the National Hall of Fame at the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Washington, D.C. in 1988, received the U.S. Wheelchair Tennis Association Community Service Award in 1990 and 1998 for outstanding contributions to tennis development for wheelchair players and the Hall of Fame for Northern Nevada Tennis Association in 1997 and the Soroptimist International of the Americas’ “Woman of Distinction” in recognition of her professional and voluntary accomplishments in the program of Health and Education, September 11, 1991. Bonni Sue is healing from a recent MS flare in Eastern Plumas Health Care’s skilled nursing while maintaining her home at Sierra Valley Apartments and keeping regular hours at an office behind Stuff n’ Things on Highway 49 in Loyalton. Her office in Loyalton is for the MS Society and a support group focused on Rural Outreach to Wellness which serves Sierra, Plumas and Lassen Counties. It is a Nevada non-profit 17 years, when Bonni Sue started her vision in 1984 during an eleven-month hospital stay at Washoe Medical Center in Reno. It is to co-create and build, for physically challenged adults and children, families and communities, a sustainable “green” eco-village designed as an educational and prevention/wellness transformative self-healing retreat. Through the Rplefct (“a ripple effect,”) Foundation, she is focused on Phase 1 with Bureau of Land Management in CA for 60 acres in Palomino Valley in Nevada near the Mustang holding ground and Phase II, a 1,000-acre mountain transformational retreat center for the physically disabled, their families and communities. Bonni Sue says silence is a prerequisite and it’s healing. “We will be exploring consciousness studies, medicine, science, transpersonal psychology and the perennial philosophy of the ages,” she states. Several hospitals and philanthropic organizations have requested her presentations on the Rplefct Foundation. She is at her Loyalton office every afternoon which she calls her “healing space.” Its window space, overstuffed chairs and her 1918 piano are all for wellness. Meetings for those with Multiple Sclerosis, one on one or groups and families are all about community. And, she is getting the first laptop to do social networking to be in sync. Bonni Sue is a registered nurse in both states 35 years and is keeping current with new therapies and therapeutic medicines coming out; a lot oral and she says, “A lot going on; changes.” Having had MS 45 years, she calls it “true and dear to my heart.” She believes in living life fully and will learn how to walk again. In the meantime, her power chair allows her any place accessible. Living temporarily at the skilled nursing allows her the physical therapy and rehabilitation needed. “Patience, humor and faith,” are her mantra, “not particularly in that order,” she adds. Bonnie will celebrate a Grand Opening at Suite 1, 213 Main Street, Hiway 49 in Loyalton on Saturday, June 28 from 1 to 5 p.m. Messages can be left at (530) 993-4499 between 1 and 6 p.m. daily.