I got outside four times this week. That means I rolled around the sidewalk circuit in the backyard. Four complete circuits equal 1 mile.
The best thing about this backyard is that the gardens are mature and full of perennials. About 30 years old mature, just like the building itself. Even though the garden was put to bed six months ago, and now looks like a wasteland as if nothing will ever grow there again, I know a month from now the irises will be reaching through the mucky dirt for the sun, and the five flowering crab trees will be drenched in pink and white blossoms that will lead eventually to crabapple jelly on homemade bread. Over the next six months there will be lilacs, roses and hydrangeas, peonies and lilies of yellow, rust, white and orange. Soon the spring peepers will sing me to sleep at night. The promise of spring indeed.
But I digress. A week ago I was one of the few residents to venture out on the sidewalk, because stretches of it were still covered in snow and ice. As long as it wasn’t too deep or slippery, I could roll over it in my power wheelchair no problem*. In fact, my chair and I became an icebreaker of sorts. Then I really got into it, backing up and going over the snowy and icy patches again and again. I had a purpose now. I was helping Spring get further along. The chunks I broke off could be melted easily by the sun and evaporated by the wind. It became a project. By the time I headed out late Sunday morning – the last of the four days – there was really only a three-foot-long section remaining. I moved my chair forwards and backwards so the wheels could pulverize the rough edges at each end*. When I left after half an hour or so that stretch was well on its way to oblivion.
My activities had caused quite a stir among the residents. When I got back into the building and went past the front desk, I found out there’d been many calls about me. Anyone with a window facing the backyard saw me. At first they thought I was stuck on the ice and needed help to get off. Then, to their great confusion, I turned around and drove through it again. What the hell is she doing out there? I could imagine the old folks puzzling over my bizarre behaviour.
Life here has been rather dull since we’ve been under viral house arrest. I had a lot of fun playing in the snow. I’m happy I inadvertently perked up their day a bit.
*Wheelchair 101: Manual chairs are the ones you push yourself or someone else pushes for you. Power wheelchairs have rechargeable batteries and are more substantial. You use a joystick to drive them. Just as you use the joystick to move characters around in a video game, or a mouse to push the cursor on a computer, when you move it back and forth or side to side the wheelchair reacts accordingly.
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