Take off your hat, I want to stand up.

Chapter 44: The A & W.

Chapter 44: The A & W.

Take me to the A&W, please.

Once the van was converted to be wheel-chair accessible it sat in the underground garage. Every once in a while some one would want to take Ev out. She was after all a quadriplegic. It was very difficult for anyone to take responsibility for her, on their own. What if she went into cardiac arrest, stopped breathing, had a spasm attack? None of these issues would be a concern. She was normal, save the movement of her body. She yearned to be out of the institution.

A few weeks following her bout with spinal meningitis Ev was getting restless. A new day was here and everyone yearned to be outdoors, especially my sequestered mom.

Jackie take me to the A&W.  I would love a teen burger with raw onions, onion rings and a rootbeer float. It was spring. The flowers were out in spectacular bloom. The trees had brought forth a quiet green and the birds sang their songs high in the Elm trees. Yes of course I said.

Two hours later we were almost ready to go. The staff had to prepare her for the day trip.

I found the van in the garage, fired up the reliable Chev V8, and trolled out of the space and stopped by the curb. I walked up the three fights of stairs to her room, where she waited with excited anticipation. Still she needed to be sure all of the checks and balances were dealt with by the staff and myself. Did we have extra this and more of that in case there was an earthquake or sudden winter storm, yes we have everything you will need and more. People planning to scale Mount Everest would have less goods stuffed into their packs, than we took on our two hour cruise.

I found the levers to operate the electric wheel chair. This was met by a low throated voice which indicated, no, she would do it herself. When Ev operated the wheel chair it took way, way too long to travel ten feet. She was very cautious, slow and controlled. I stepped back and she ran the operation for a hallway length and then I took over. We immediately picked up the pace as we maxed out its speed.  Ev responded to the geared up speed with laughter. Don't go so fast, let me drive, watch out for the corner, oh for heaven sakes she admonished as we speed down the hall at three miles per hour. Lightning like speed for a quad in a wheel chair. Down the long hall, passed the nurses station and finally we arrived at the door.

We managed to sidle her up to the lift, the whir of the lift motor balanced her tenderly into the up position, a quick duck of her head and push, she was in. Following a stop and go, stop again go once more, she was happy with the position. Next I was

instructed on how to fasten the chair to the van safety buckles and belts. She was ready to go. I was sweating like a sumo wrestler in a loosing effort as I swung the van out into traffic.

Her wheel chair was fitted with a multi purpose wooden tabs that acted as a table and arm rest. She also still smoked, so she had a rigged up cigarette holder attached to a rubber hose that fit into a make shift ashtray. Truly it was a mechanical engineers work piece  It worked did the job, even though it was an unsightly contraption.

Now facing forward she directed me to advance and asked if we could drive a it before we went to the drive through, sure. It was just like old times. I owed mom and took these small occasions to celebrate her wishes. I loved driving Miss Daisy. As we travelled down the main drag she would comment on this person's house, what happened to that person, who was married, who was divorced, who should be still alive, who was gone and a host of neighbourhood comments and gossip. She had a good memory for people, places and things of genuine interest. More important she was gathering a catalogue of memories she could digest later on when she was alone again.

We travelled through the park, passed the museum, by a field where children ran and played, so simple and yet she longed to be young and playing with those kids. As our journey took us by the house on 18th Avenue, the one she actually bought one day while looking at houses. This really surprised me when she decided to buy a house, all along I thought we were just looking at houses. It never occurred to me she would want to move. However, she did buy a house, four years later she missed the old neighbourhood and sold the house. We all moved back into their original home on Empress St. As it turned out the house had been rented out for the time. Now we passed the 18th Avenue house, she said, maybe we shouldn't have moved from here. She said, I really liked the house, but it was too large to clean.

Ev, I reminded her, you always had a cleaning person to help with the chores. Still it was still too big.

We checked on some of the properties she still owned and I helped her with a few smokes. I just needed to light them and hope we did not burn something in the van. She said never mind it was her van. Let's go to get something to eat, I am starving. Somehow this reminded me of our Banff trip. For the life of me I still cannot explain what we were doing in Banff, non of us skied and we did not particularly like winter, we were more Las Vegas or Hawaii people.

I pulled up to the order window, how may I help you came the pleasant electronic voice of a young high school aged woman. I started, two teen burgers. Ev piped up make sure they have raw onions, fine. Could we have raw onions on one, thank you. I want onion rings, she continued, one order of onion rings, thanks. Get me a root beer float. Alright, one root beer float, with a straw, came a voice from the back.

Will there be anything else the waiter questioned. Yes, one order of large fries and a small coffee. She was not going to let me get by without getting everything she had been dreaming about for the last few days.

Anything else? Then she spotted the hot apple pie in the convenient cardboard holder, a hot apple pie, please and thank you. We were always big on thanking people for small kindnesses and services rendered. We were brought up in a retail atmosphere where the customer was always correct and service was something to be appreciated. People were proud to serve others, most did it with a smile in their voice. We expected this in kind when we were the customer, it only makes sense.

Ev was always preaching the good books golden rule, do onto other as you yourself would have done unto you. This was our mantra, it worked its way into the fabric of our lives. We should practise this identity. As a Canadian we tend to thank everyone for everything and we are the first to say our sorries if we transgress this rule. It is even more remarkable when two Canadians take to apologizing for some small break of custom. We tend to bend over backwards to see who is more sincere in their sorry application, we mean well. We are Canadian after all.

The food came, I paid, we went to park. Ev said, I don' want to park, let's drive a little bit while we eat. It would be circus like in nature, but alright. I positioned the teenburger within reach, ketchup piled on a napkin, light a smoke, placed the straw in her rootbeer float, signalled and pulled into traffic on the busy thoroughfare, Albert St.

Things were going swimmingly, she was talking, eating, smoking and enjoying the commentary on the drive down the avenue. The sun was welcoming, traffic was light, I was handing her bites of burger, dipping onion rings into the Heinz ketchup, laughing over past events, then the light ahead turned unexpectedly yellow.

I positioned myself to get a better grip on the wheel, applied the breaks, the van nosed to a halt, smack., what was that?

Ev cried out, Jackie what are you doing? It did not occur to me that she had no body control. Of course she smacked face down into the Heinz ketchup, as I braked too hard. She said lift me out of the French fries, please and thank you. So sorry Ev, I will be more careful. We carried on down the road, this time we went at a more gentle speed.

We ate, laughed shared stories and recollections. We passed by the Legislative building, I asked her if she remembered the time she came to visit me at my house years earlier. I had just gone through a tough and personally troubling time. My esteem was wrung through the mill, I was lonely, depressed, and all around basically sad. She said yes, so along the way I retold the story.

Out of the blue she came to my house knocked on the door and invited me to go for a bike ride. I had not ridden a bike in years. I did not even own a bike.