The Challenge

Sunlight creeps under the Saturday window shade, insinuating itself into my nephew's bedroom, currently mine for the Seattle duration. I do not want to be here. Not exactly 'here' in the sense of geography, more in the sense of chronology. I am single again, visiting my brother and family as in another era. Except that I am older and more, there is no other word for it, crippled. Yes, I have somehow shifted from disabled status to crippled. The reality of my stiffening, cramping and ossifying body would have been nicely muted by the presence of Marlou. All it takes is a slight change of scene to throw off what's left of my balance, strength and flexibility.

Take my nephew's bed. The Sealey Posturepedic landscape varies just enough from that of home to interrupt my sleep with major feats of reaching and turning. Peeing in the night, a routine semiconscious grabbing of plastic urinals, takes major concentration and surprising physical efforts at balance and body tilting. But all that is behind me, the morning being upon me. The day blares beyond the shade. The globally warmed summer in Seattle. Things to be done. Bathroom things. I wrench my abdominal muscles into a sit-up posture. It takes a few tries, but my torso follows. For a moment I sit on the edge of the bed watching the room ever so slightly spin. I drink some water. Up on my feet, arm in the metal crutch sleeve, and I set off clicking down the hallway.

In the bathroom there is a surprise. My sister-in-law has purchased the sort of shower chair that extends over the edge of the bathtub, allowing the disabled user to slide into the general target area of water, soap and shampoo. This is the good news, that everyone is trying to help me. The bad news is that I am an ingrate, do not want to use this or any other shower chair, and would happily spend the next month or two in a hammock being carried about by trained professionals, fed intravenously and presented with the occasional Netflix, save for moments when my keepers slip a little heroin into my veins.

Not to worry, for nothing could be farther from the current reality. I ease my arthritic self onto the shower chair, slide toward the center of the bathtub and stop. The legs of the bench are not far enough into the tub. The whole thing needs to be moved to the left. Which requires that I stand. Which is unreasonably predicated upon footing, balance and strength. Nevermind. I will have to make do. Next step, drag the paralyzed right leg over the edge of the tub and inside it. Just as I do at home. I give this a go. I hook the leg with both good and bad hands, yank and try to drag the limb up and over the porcelain. But something about this isn't working. The height, the angle, I can't say which. I grab and pull hard. The leg does not quite make it in.

'Do you want some help?' My brother has been appearing at the bathroom door every few minutes with this question. I tell him no. In a few minutes my brother-in-law, visiting from Phoenix, will ask the same question. No, I will say.

Yes, I finally tell my brother. He walks away. Maybe it's my tone. Maybe he didn't hear. This is humiliating beyond words. I am stuck getting into a bathtub. Something I routinely do on my own at home has become impossible. I yell for my brother, he appears and the leg gets lifted into the tub. I have a go at showering. My brother asks if I can reach the faucet. The latter appears to be within range, so I say yes. Anything he can do? No. Once he has left the bathroom, I strain toward the faucet, mess about with the soap and only drop the shampoo once. I respond to all dropping of things, failures of neuromuscular capacity and general fumblings with mounting denunciations of myself. I am stupid and incapable beyond belief. I try to put the brakes on this insidious tendency toward the self-destructive.

Which is why although the shower experience is less than completely satisfying...I cannot reach certain vital parts of me...this will have to do. I insist, wisely or unwisely, on getting my leg out of the tub, sliding my butt around and standing up, all on my own. I yell for my brother's help to get dressed. I have not fallen. I am in a dangerous mood.

At day's end, we journey into downtown Seattle to witness the Seafair Parade. I love a parade! I don't, particularly on this day, but this is not a good day. I seem to be drifting in a depressive fog. This may explain why I approach Seattle's busy Fourth Ave. and keep going, oblivious to the red light and headed directly into traffic. My brother yells. I come to slightly.

We find a vantage point at the edge of the parade route. Minutes later, it starts rolling by. And this procession through the city streets is so utterly American, one cannot but feel an affection. It's all the same everywhere in the USA. Drill teams. School bands, local dignitaries riding in open cars. Horses. Clowns. Ethnic constituents. The latter include Sikhs, who march along the street brandishing swords which, every block or so, they wield in mock battle. Alaska Airlines, the parade's official sponsor, appears here and there in small ways. It's a small airline, after all, and their float is just a jaunty little plywood airplane. Flight attendants march along with airline food carts, the sort of narrow rolling metal boxes normally pushed up and down the aisles. Here the attendants maneuver them in formation. It rains intermittently. We go home.

The next day finds us, all of us which now includes my sister, at the Bellevue Athletic Club. It's an executive sort of place. My brother belongs to it, and within about an hour I wish I did too. It takes a lot of athletic tape to tie my paralyzed right foot to the pedal of a recumbent exercycle. Still, my sister does an impressive job. True, the heel keeps hitting the pedal crank, and my good left foot keeps sliding out of the stirrup. But I do get sort of an aerobic workout over the next 30 minutes. If nothing else, the bike is easy to get off. This contrasts unpleasantly with the exercycle I use at home, an awkward model with a high center bar that requires elaborate maneuvering to get my foot up and over. So, just for the hell of it, I move to another exercycle here at the Bellevue Athletic Club. The workout is better, but my foot eventually slips right off the pedal. I stare at it in defeat.

Would I like to use the spa? Swim in the pool? My sister and sister-in-law are both there, all solicitous and patient. No, I tell them in disgust. This is one of those moments when it is an enormous struggle not to piss on everything, to not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Okay, I say, the spa. On the way to which I am determined to shower, the morning effort being what it was. The latter proves to be the roll-in variety, a wheelchair-friendly stall at the end of the row. I am out and moving toward the hot tub, when I stop to take a look at the pools.

There are two of them, and one is only four feet deep. This minimizes drowning fear, always a considerable drag on the quadriplegic swimmer's flywheel. Furthermore, there is a disabled-friendly set of shallow steps lined with railings. I am in and do three laps before I know it. As for the spa, the Jacuzzi jets pummel my stiff neck and shoulders with penetrating blasts of warmth. Within 10 minutes, I am rigatoni. On the way out, working my way up the steps, my sister stands behind me, my brother in front. Our parents were inattentive in unfortunate ways, but both my siblings are now fully present and accounted for in taking care of me. I need to remember this. Especially since taking care of myself has become such a challenge.