On a day when you collide with reality…or maybe arrive at work late and collide with your desk…well, you can be pretty certain that all this is operating on the metaphorical level. Unless you’re a quadriplegic. Then, nothing is level, Everything is uphill. And things may, or may not, be
metaphors. Which explains why yesterday I collided with my desk.
Vehicular collisions in the quadriplegic world are in no way confined to streets. In fact, they can involve furniture, vis-à-vis, desks. Not to beat about the metaphorical bush…but I was somewhat distractedly at work, pondering weighty matters such as how to begin a chapter in my next book. Wham. I had somehow driven my wheelchair into the edge of my desk and beyond. I mean, when you’re going to do a thing, do it, right? And since it’s entirely possible to drive a wheelchair forward, why not drive it really hard, so that the control arm/joystick leaps over the edge of the desk and bends backward. Why, a sensible person would ask. But that would be too sensible. Make do with “how.”
To which I cannot respond. Honestly, I was sitting at my desk, dreamily musing on wording and mood when I slammed into the front edge of my wooden desk…and kept going for some distance, the control arm raising and bending. I don’t know what happened. The whole experience does remind me quite unpleasantly of being unable to take my foot off the accelerator of my Chrysler. Another collision. Making, for me, 2016 the Year of Collisions. The year was the same for everyone…just more abstract for most.
I can speculate. I was moving my chair slightly forward, not paying attention…and the shock of hitting the edge of the desk made me freeze, While the wheelchair just kept going. The fact that I can’t explain my own actions is most unnerving. Although if I’m brutally honest, it’s always been somewhat like this, life. At least neurologically abnormal life. Which accounts for 50 of my 70 years. No, I don’t really know what happened. Yes, things are out of control. Are they declining? Oh, doubtless. More to the point, can anything be done? No. Except to be hyper aware. Which is good advice for old-age. And, yes, that’s what this is. There’s no arguing with 70.
As for being depressed about it all…no, I can’t stay down. Well, I can, but I won’t. After all in this country we have bigger political fish to fry. I have survived to ‘live in interesting times.’ That’s what these are. The times, they are a changing. The New York Times may be changing too. It’s taken time for everyone who has some fondness for logic and truth to adjust. But it’s happening fast. Lots of good reasons to turn my wheelchair speed down to slow.