Gone

by Linda K. Olson

  “Okay, this seems doable. I think you’ll need a . . . What’s the name of it? You know, the suicide-knob thing?” Dave asked.

  “A necker knob, or a granny knob,” I said. Sheesh. Stump, suicide, and granny knobs. Who makes up words? “It’s not the steering that concerns me. It’s these legs that I don’t know about.”

  “Move the seat up and see if you can get your foot on the gas pedal,” Dave said.

  I lifted my right leg and was rewarded by nothing more than the rigid plastic thigh moving up. My foot was nowhere near the gas pedal. Wiggling my thigh up and down and side to side did not get the fake foot any closer to the pedal. So, again, I leaned over, grabbed my lower pant leg, pulled the foot up, and flopped it onto the gas pedal. So far, so good. But that was the end of it.

  When I tried to move it to the brake pedal, it just hung suspended in air. Letting go of the steering wheel to grab my pant leg and reposition my foot wasn’t going to cut it. I wanted to pull off the worthless fake legs and throw them as far as I could, watch them fly off into the wild blue yonder, where they’d be as useless as they were here.

  “Why couldn’t I have lost just one leg? Think of all the things I could still do with one leg and one arm.”

  I tried to push down the frustration and fear that were rising to the surface in the form of hot tears.

  Dave leaned across the center console, kissed my neck, and said, “We’ll figure it out. At least you have the prescription so we can get what we need to adapt the car. Let’s see what they say.”

  A few days later, prescription in hand, we entered the Sharp Rehab Center for an appointment with Sandy Bartlow, a driving rehab specialist. I walked in with my quad cane and distinctive toy-soldier gait, hoping she’d see how strong and accomplished I was.

  “I must admit that you are a challenge. Most of our patients are paraplegics or stroke victims, and while they have weak or paralyzed limbs, at least they have four extremities for us to work with. I’ve never seen a triple amputee, let alone had one try to drive.”

  My firm handshake got her attention. “Well, that arm is certainly strong,” she said.

  She had many concerns. Was my core strength adequate for sitting, steering, and using a gas-brake device? Could I turn my head to see behind me? Was my arm strong enough to steer? Had I ever driven before? Did I have head trauma? Could I pass the driving test?

  “A person needs two extremities to drive, one for steering and the other for gas and brake. Right?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she answered. “The typical adaptive driving setup is a lever on the steering column for gas and brake, with a spinner knob on the steering wheel for turning. Then the controls for headlights, turn signals, windshield wipers, and horn need to be located so you can reach them with whichever residual hand you have. Let’s go sit in the driver’s-ed car and see what you can do.”

  I gamely opened the car door, sat down, and rolled my eyes at Dave. In less than two minutes, Sandy knew there wasn’t an off-the-shelf device for me.

  “Is there a company in town that does adaptive work on vehicles? Would it help to go talk to them and see if they have any ideas?” I asked.

  “The big question is, are you going to need a wheelchair all or most of the time? If so, we should put you in a van so you can drive while sitting in it.”

  It sounded as though Sandy thought this might be my only solution.

  “I want to drive a car, just like everyone else,” I said.

  “In that case,” she said, “I think we should go to a company over on Ronson Road.”

  I closed my eyes and fought the dark, bottomless pit inside me as Dave drove me home.

  George Hendrickson was a paraplegic World War II vet who, with Butch Lee, started manufacturing hand-control devices for paraplegics. We hit it off immediately. George seemed to be in charge. He was a salty character with a twinkle in his eyes and a joke for everything. His graying blond hair, weathered face, and gravelly voice belied his heart of gold. He made me feel attractive and maybe even a little sexy. Butch was more reserved and slightly dour. His flat-top haircut was vintage ’50s. Their work uniform seemed to be white T-shirts and faded blue jeans. Together, their brains and brawn had given the gift of mobility to hundreds of disabled people years before the Americans with Disabilities Act.

  After the initial pleasantries and jocularity, I sat down in the driver’s seat of our car and watched George as he rolled up in his sleek, low-slung wheelchair. He parked as close to me as he could get.

  “Okay,” he said. “Let’s see what you can do. I want you to get comfortable.” He reached down for the seat lever. “Move the seat to a position where you can rest your hand easily on the steering wheel.”

  I tried to move the seat forward. Nothing happened. I tried to jump a little to move the seat forward. Still nothing.

  George straightened up. “You’re going to need a power seat, power windows and door locks and power steering, and an automatic transmission. It’s pretty expensive to get all this stuff.”

  I felt as if we’d slammed into the first roadblock at sixty miles per hour.

  Dave reacted first. “Looks like we need to buy a new car before we go any further.” He turned to George. “What would you suggest? What makes or models work best for the equipment you need to put in them?” After some discussion, George told us to look at Oldsmobiles and see if we could drive one back to Manufacturing & Production Services (MPS) for their approval before we completed the purchase.

  “Well, let’s do what we can today. Will you be wearing your artificial legs when you drive?”

  I hadn’t thought about that.

  “Hmm, it would be nice to be able to drive with or without them,” I said. After thinking for a second, I added, “Actually, I’ll need to have them on if I’m not using a wheelchair, and I don’t want to have to use a wheelchair, so with, I guess.”

  “Okay. Get yourself settled in whatever position you’re most comfortable in; then I want you to plant your heels on the floor and swivel your knee sideways, back and forth—only one to two inches each way.”

  He watched my every move with the eyes and mind of an engineer.

  “Hey, Butch. Come over and take a look. I’m thinking we could bastardize one of our hand-control devices, somehow mount it under the seat and connect it to her right knee. Maybe she could activate the gas while pushing out and the brake by pulling in with her knee. What do you think?”

  Later that week, Dave drove me back to MPS in a brand-new Oldsmobile Omega. Our foursome gathered in the parking lot to do a final assessment. George rolled out of the way so Butch could lean in and assess the situation. He felt the space under the driver’s seat. I blushed, even though my fake legs couldn’t feel his touch, when he put his head between them to look under the dashboard to make sure he had room to install the mechanical parts.

  “Yeah, I think we can do something. Maybe fabricate a metal yoke that will cradle her knee so she gets gas and brake with small, back-and-forth, sideways movements,” Butch said to George.

  As he straightened up, he eyeballed the interior of the car. His mechanic’s mind was looking at the location of all the functions I’d need to be able to reach with my left hand: headlight high beams and dimmer, horn, windshield wipers, and turn signals. He hesitated as he looked at the gearshift lever on the right side of the steering column.

  “Can you reach the gearshift lever?” he asked. “You’re going to have to let go of the steering wheel and stick your hand through it to move the lever up and down when you put it in reverse or park.”

  I had a small panic attack but then realized that with an automatic gear shift, I would change gears only when the car was at a standstill, so steering shouldn’t be a problem.

  “Well,” Butch said as he turned toward George, “this just might work. It’ll be a one-of-a-kind installation.”

  He winked as he stood up and said, “I just don’t want to see you waving at people as you’re turning corner
s.” I wanted to smother them with hugs and kisses.

  My driving lessons took place with Sandy and Dave in the parking lot of Jack Murphy Stadium, at that time the home of the Padres and Chargers, San Diego’s professional baseball and football teams.

  Holding the key with my left hand, I twisted my wrist around, trying to insert the key into the ignition on the right side of the steering column. It didn’t work—I couldn’t turn it far enough. Leaving the key in the ignition, I repositioned my hand. Several times.

  “Damn it,” I said. “This should be the simple part.” I finally found the right angle, and with a firm push, I started the engine. What a marvelous sound! This was going to work.

  My mind knew how to drive. Using one hand for what would normally have been two hands was fairly straightforward. It just required attention to detail and crossing my hand back and forth quickly. With fifteen years of driving under my belt, I knew it should be just a matter of mastering the brake and acceleration functions with my knee instead of my foot. It seemed to me that the fright reaction would be to pull in, so braking became the inward motion. That left gas as the outward knee push. Intellectually, this made perfect sense. Until I tried it.

  The engine was running. I was comfortably seated. I looked around. The vast stadium parking lot was empty, a mile of asphalt around me. One more glance right to left.

  “Okay, Linda, give it a try.” Dave’s voice was quiet and patient. Leaving the gearshift lever in park, I pulled in with my knee and watched the brake pedal depress. I pushed out and heard the engine rev into a roar. Oops, that was a bit much. Good thing I was still in park; otherwise, we’d have catapulted over the stadium. I did it again. This time, almost nothing.

  “Dave, this is really weird. I can’t feel anything. I can tell my leg is moving, but I have no idea how much.”

  A driving demon howled inside me, Ha, you can’t do it. I tried again, this time so gently and slowly that my leg quivered. No acceleration. What’s wrong? There’s no sensation. This is a problem.

  I sat still and tried to clinically think my way through the challenge. Putting my hand on my thigh, I pushed it from side to side. Why, of course! My proprioception was way off-kilter. In fact, my feet proprioceptors were totally gone.

  Wikipedia defines proprioception as “the sense of the relative position of neighboring parts of the body and strength of effort being employed in movement.” It goes on to state:

  The brain integrates information from proprioception and from the vestibular system into its overall sense of body position, movement, and acceleration. Proprioception is what allows someone to learn to walk in complete darkness without losing balance. During the learning of any new skill, sport, or art, it is usually necessary to become familiar with some proprioceptive tasks specific to that activity. Without the appropriate integration of proprioceptive input, an artist would not be able to brush paint onto a canvas without looking at the hand as it moved the brush over the canvas; it would be impossible to drive an automobile because a motorist would not be able to steer or use the pedals while looking at the road ahead; a person could not touch-type or perform ballet; and people would not even be able to walk without watching where they put their feet.

  In addition to major proprioception deficits, I had essentially put my residual leg inside a tight-fitting tin can and then pushed the can against a metal lever. I couldn’t sense how much brake or acceleration I’d get each time until after I’d pushed it and the car started moving. Plus, sensations from my skin were missing because I was encased in the “can.” This would be a new experiment every time I started the car and got situated.

  Oh well—I’d just have to get over it and make it work.

  Ten years later, I returned to the stadium parking lot to practice using a different adaptive driving device, one that the Ability Center had installed in my new, blue Taurus station wagon. A lot had changed. Dave was in the front passenger seat, but our eleven-year-old daughter and eight-year-old son were passengers in the back seat. They were by then accustomed to their mom’s automobile idiosyncrasies: air-conditioning always on full blast, Christmas music blaring in July, obsession with putting the turn signal on way before the turn.

  Dave had taught them handicapped-placard etiquette and how to deal with obtuse drivers who park in handicapped spots “for just a minute to run in.”

  “We never park in blue spots unless Mom is getting out of the car. When you are parked there, a person who needs it can’t park there.”

  “Come on, Mom,” Tiffany said. “Hit the gas! Why are you going so slow?”

  “Yeah,” Brian echoed. “Show us what you can do.”

  I pushed out with my right thigh, and the car shot forward across the vast, empty lot, wind blowing our hair. When I looked in the rearview mirror, I saw that the kids had outfitted themselves in elbow and knee pads and batting helmets advertising 31 Flavors and the San Diego Padres. They looked as if they were having the time of their lives, flopping around as if they were going to fly out of the car at any second.

  I pulled a little more strongly than necessary on the brake and snuck another look back at them. Their eyes got really big, and they shrieked even more loudly as they rolled around in the back seat. We laughed so hard that by the time the car stopped, tears were running down our cheeks.

  Years later, I still feel an adrenaline rush as I cruise down Torrey Pines Road—the giddy sense of freedom and happiness I get every day as I drive alone, going wherever I want, whenever I want. I never take driving for granted. It is my equalizer. It lets me forget for a while the things I can’t do, lets me be a productive, normal person.

  With a new house, a new baby, prospects for a new job, and my first adaptive driving device, I knew normalcy was within reach.

  CHAPTER 9:

  Tits and Ass

  “Tiffany,” I called out. “Daddy’s ready to go.”

  I heard our two-year-old run out of her room and come bouncing down the stairs to where I sat in my wheelchair. She loved going to Grandma and Grandpa Hodgens’s house with its huge backyard and garden. In particular, she loved Grandpa’s wheelbarrow. It was a cherished sight to see him pushing and careening around the yard while she shrieked and yelled, “Faster, Grandpa. Go faster!”

  “I’m glad your parents are in such good shape,” I said to Dave. “She’d wear them out if they weren’t.”

  He kissed my forehead and, with a dramatic swoop, scooped Tiffany up into his arms and halfway over his shoulder. He blew her blond hair out of his face as she kicked and giggled and leaned toward the door.

  After they left, I let out a big sigh of relief and turned to packing my suitcase: a dress for eating out at the nice restaurants we’d already chosen, jeans for most of our sightseeing in Santa Barbara and at the Santa Ynez Valley wineries we hoped to visit, a bathing suit in case there was a hot tub, and my skimpy lingerie.

  As the road stretched out ahead of us and San Diego shrank in the rearview mirror, Dave unwound more and more. His goofy, let’s-have-fun side eclipsed his no-nonsense, get-things-done side. It reminded me of the feelings I’d had years before on the beach near Punta Estrella, Mexico.

  “I think this is it,” Dave said as he parked and we got out of the car. The sun warmed my skin, and the sky reflected endless possibilities. A relatively flat dirt trail headed into a shady, wooded area. I gripped Dave’s rigidly flexed right arm with my left arm and leaned on him as I hiked using my prostheses. When I got tired, I draped my arm over his shoulders and he carried me. We were young and strong enough to do the half-mile walk alternating between my walking and his carrying me.

  Our effort was rewarded when we reached our destination and looked at the ancient pictographs of Chumash Painted Cave through the protective grate. Dave stood quietly, taking it all in. After several minutes, he turned and asked, “Can you imagine what it was like to be an Ice Age caveman living among saber-toothed cats and dire wolves?”

  “Nope,” I said as I put my arm
around his neck and purred, “How about ‘Me Tarzan, you Jane’?”

  “Ooh . . . Now, that’s nice,” he whispered in my ear.

  Rests on the way back were frequent because the walking and carrying were difficult.

  “I’ve got to put you down for a minute,” Dave said.

  The woods were quiet, and all my day-to-day distractions had melted away. I noticed every fiber of Dave’s hard muscles as he lowered me to the uneven ground and jogged off-trail.

  “Be right back,” he said over his shoulder before disappearing into the woods.

  Running back to me with a big grin on his face, he picked me up and carried me into the trees. My braless boobs jiggled against him, and I kissed the back of his neck as he hauled me to a big, flat granite slab. From our spot, which was completely hidden from the trail, we had a beautiful view out to the north, over a canyon. The midday sun warmed us as I snuggled up against him.

  “Mmm,” he said. “You feelin’ friendly?”

  “Mm-hmm. Me hot little cavewoman,” I murmured with a throaty giggle.

  “I like being alone with you in the woods,” he whispered.

  I looked into his green eyes and held his gaze as he kissed me on the lips. Then we melted into each other in our ancient rock boudoir. Afterward, we lay quietly, basking in the afterglow. I could have stayed there forever.

  The Chumash Painted Cave State Historic Park website has this to say: “We are working to improve accessibility throughout our parks, but we regret that there are currently no accessible activities at this park.” Dave and I beg to differ!

  Our son, Brian, was born nine months later.

  Every year on Brian’s birthday, Dave gets a sly grin on his face, and I know he’s daydreaming about our romantic interlude on that big, flat rock.