October 2004 Archives
Blogs are supposed to be fast-paced and ever-changing icons of the Digital Age, but in middle age, the fast-paced and ever-changing gives way to something else...which combined with doing one's quadriplegic best to make a living in the deteriorating American economy...adds up to this apology. Sorry. On with the blog saga which, when we last sighted our wheeling hero, was progressing up Taylor Blvd. in the San Francisco suburb of Pleasant Hill....
"Where the Sidewalk Ends" is no children's fable on Taylor Blvd. It occurs suddenly, only a couple of blocks from where I'd turned. One option is to roll out into the street and whir up the bicycle lane. The other is to head into a leafy park, which seems logical, because all of Pleasant Hill, California, appears to be a leafy park, each street overhung by broad-leafed mulberries or something similar, all cozy and green. The path smooths out, and I'm zipping along at my wheelchair's maximum speed of 8 mph, rivaling the performance of a long-distance runner. That's batteries versus Gatorade, folks, and, frankly, I'd bet on the Gatorade. Wheelchairs and wheelchair batteries seem to be slipping backwards, technologically speaking. Disabled gear targets what in the Bush era is considered a marketplace, but in any other epoch would be termed "poor people." The unemployed or underemployed predominate in this vital wheelchair-buying corner of the free economy…and wheelchairs seem to be getting heavier and slower. Or maybe that's just me. Zipping through the park, I hail a couple of guys in work clothes, ask where's the community center, and they ask me if I'm heading for the AARP meeting.
I'm too young to belong to the American Association of Retired Persons. Which is a lie. I've been eligible for more than two years. This sobering fact has yet to sink in. Just like, it took me about 10 years after my injury to fully grasp that I was disabled. But that's another story. The AARP gathers in a large, glassy room with sunlight pouring through the windows, hope and modernity suffusing everything. Fred comes up to me, extends his hand and introduces himself. I shake with my left, he with his right. I glance around the room, spotting 30, maybe 40 in attendance. It's after lunch, and they're eating cake. It's not healthy eating cake, but then, it's not healthy being old. I refuse the cake. Fred is a big, fleshy guy with little solid presence. He is there, and he isn't there. I particularly want him there to get the slide projector set up. After all, I am the afternoon's featured speaker. I will also need a microphone in this room. My quadriplegic's lung capacity is slim at the best of times, and these oldsters need volume. I notice that some of the oldsters aren't so old. A couple are more my age. What kind of group is this?
What kind of talk is this? It's a little set piece I've developed in my underutilized, a.k.a., spare, time. All about Amtrak. Why discuss Amtrak, America's risible national railroad system? Because it's what we have, railwise. And the truth is that Amtrak is a heroic effort at forging the nation's decrepit freight rail lines into something that works for people. And, by the way, people love it, despite the freight railroad's attempts to delay Amtrak's trains and drive it out of existence. In short, it's a cause both hopeless and quixotic, perfect for an aging quadriplegic.
I begin my speech on a high note. The high note is that I am genuinely grateful to be here. It's been a long transit journey. From its vague outlines on the County Connection web site, the 109 bus had me feeling uncertain. But I have managed the transit vagaries beautifully. I've even had the non-stereotypically-male sense to stop a couple of workmen in a park and ask for directions. And now I'm here, in front of these people and ready to discourse on trains and passengers and Amtrak. I wonder what they want to hear. I wonder about this far too much. I should really wonder about how I feel about having one paralyzed hand and one unparalyzed hand to work two electronic devices: a slide projector control and a wireless microphone. I cannot handle both at the same time. Throughout my talk, I am plagued by this. To advance a slide, I must turn off the microphone, put it down on my lap, and pick up the slide projector control and press a button. To speak, I must reverse the process, dropping the projector control on my lap and grabbing the mike. It's disconcerting and creates long, strange pauses in my speech.
I'm trying to get everyone fired up about Amtrak and budget cuts to a national rail system that carries 20 million people per year. I talk about my journeys on the Coast Starlight, the train that connects Seattle and Los Angeles. I ask people in the audience to share their train experiences. They do, and after half an hour, I figure it's time to stop. When it's over, one old guy comes up and tells me I did a pretty good job. Fred gives me a certificate thanking me for my service to the AARP.
I roll outside and look for the County Connection bus stop. What I look for first is a sidewalk. There isn't one. The sidewalk has ended, permanently. There is a parking lot, a busy parking lot, and I do what isn't the wisest thing for a low-rider in a wheelchair. I drive through the parking lot, weaving amongst the moving cars. It's a suburban ordeal, but at the other end is the County Connection bus stop. I park under the sign and look expectantly up the street. My God, here comes the bus. It's completely empty. Just me and the driver. He straps me in. We head for BART, the local subway, repeating the long, arcing detours through senior housing developments. It takes half an hour. It takes half a life to do anything serious. Though, with a disability, everything is serious. And I don't have half a life left. Seriously.
