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As youth group games go, the rules for this one were pretty simple. At the far end of the room were two trays full of ice and marbles. The object of the game was to run to the tray, pick up a marble with your toes, and hop back. The team that could fish out all its marbles first would win. No problem, right?

Well, it was a problem for Joel Sonnenberg. With a twinkle in his eye, Joel asked his youth pastor, "What if you don't have any toes?"

Joel lost his toes, as well as one hand and the fingers on the other, when more than 85 percent of his body was burned in a car accident 19 years ago.

It's a miracle he didn't lose his life.

On September 15, 1979, 22-month-old Joel was riding in a car with his father and his uncle. In another car were Joel's mother, aunt, and 3-year-old sister. The family was headed for a nice, relaxing vacation in Maine. But then, while they were stopped at a New Hampshire toll booth, a 36-ton tractor trailer slammed into the row of cars that included the ones carrying Joel and his family.

The women climbed out of their car unhurt. But the green Chevy carrying Joel went up in flames. Joel's dad and uncle rushed out with their clothing and hair on fire. Each thought the other one had grabbed Joel. Neither had.

A 20-year-old passerby heard Joel's cries, reached into the car, and pulled him out in his car seat. When Joel's mom found her son on the ground behind her, he looked like a mass of ash. His arms were charred and quivering, his hair was gone, and his face was black; he was literally smoldering.

Emergency personnel arrived in minutes, poured water on Joel to cool his skin, and rushed him by ambulance to a nearby hospital. From there he was taken to a larger hospital in Boston. There, he was given a 10 percent shot at survival.

A few days later Joel was transferred to the Shriners Burn Institute across town, where he received advanced treatment, namely painful skin grafts. He stayed remarkably strong throughout the whole ordeal. Four and a half months later, after countless surgeries, he returned with his parents to the family's home in Nyack, New York.

But that was only the first step on Joel's long, long road to living a somewhat normal life. He suffered through more surgeries and excruciating treatments for years. He lived with constant physical and emotional pain.

When he was a little boy, Joel quickly began to experience how cruel the world can be to people who are "different." Stares and comments followed him everywhere. People left restaurants because his face upset them.

Even now, 19 years later, Joel still gets some of the same responses from uncomfortable strangers. And he's not always sure how to react.

"Sometimes I feel angry," he admits. "Sometimes I just ignore them. Sometimes I want to have a little fun with them—follow them around or crazy stuff like that. Sometimes it's suffocating. Sometimes I just want to get away.

"I'd like to say that I just smile every time, but that's not the case. I don't want to pretend that it is. I'm still learning to smile at people's curiosity."

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