The colors and the flashing lights are exactly what I need right now, but what’s even better is the action. Who cares about Monday story time when there’s so many people running around and actually DOING things?
As I’m getting more and more into the movie or television show or whatever the visual brilliance is that is in front of me, she is blocking my view, tisking. She starts to crouch down so she can look into my pathetic excuse for eyes and I can’t help but squeak out a groan. At least I can still see the colored lights flash around her head, mocking me.
Fingers snap in my face to get my attention. With her this close, how can she not have my attention? I want to scream at her. Her bow of a mouth covered in bright red lipstick starts to open and I cringe on the inside.
“Mr. Dietz? Mr. Dietz?” She does her snapping again, which is somehow more annoying than the ridiculously loud volume of her voice. “Mr. Dietz, pay attention, sir.” She uses the word sir as a badge of respect when she doesn’t have any measure of respect.
After glaring into my droopy eyes for a bit longer, she seems resigned to continue talking with me but doesn’t smug tone from her voice. “You’re not going to be allowed to watch any more television, sir.”
And who says? I respond.
“I have decided that it isn’t good for you. You’re eyes are too bad to see anything useful and it will excite you too much. Instead, we’re going to be taking you outside to sit in the sun. Won’t that be nice?” There is no real cheer to her voice.
If my cotton-picking eyes aren’t good enough to see a television, then what the heck am I supposed to see outside? I am irate. I have no use for sunshine because the glare makes my retinas burn. At least, I think they’re my retinas.
Lips pursed for a moment, she studies me again. “The fresh air will do you good, and it wouldn’t hurt to get a little vitamin D to you through your skin. I hear it’s all the rage in nursing homes in England.” She stands up and starts to move to my back, taking a hold of the handles on my wheelchair. She’s done explaining things to me. I get one last glance at the television and the vibrance of the picture before she turns me around.
It takes me a moment of speaking until I explode, England? ENGLAND? You, madam, are a liar. Next time you use that line, say somewhere like Australia or Japan, but not England. Do you even understand how little sun they get in the first place, let alone enough to sit their old codgers outside to soak up? Use your fancy cures on someone else, I’m not buying.
She pushes me quickly, apparently foreseeing what is going to happen, which wasn’t a hard guess after I had outsmarted her. The only reply that I received was a gentle, almost melodic humming. It wasn’t a song I recognized and I was glad. That would have given us something in common.
Hold everything! The door that we were approaching led outside. It was just wide enough for a wheel chair to fit through. Anything bigger would get stuck. With the strength of a malnourished three year old, I fling my arm out as she shuttles me through the door just in time for it to catch and for me to feel my arm wrench out of socket.
To her credit, she stops immediately and backs up so my arm isn’t wedged between the door and my chair anymore. My sleeve is caught on a stray piece of wire that had once held some sort of decoration next to the door. She carefully unhooks me, and places my hand back in my lap. “Mr. Dietz, don’t do things like that. You might hurt yourself.” She mumbled in a less than concerned voice. With the way my shoulders stoop, she must not notice that the shoulder is completely out of socket and just hanging in the vortex of my skin.
As we get through the door without incident this time, a young man who was about to enter stops and looks at her. His smile shows that he thinks she’s attractive. Son, how can you think that this harpy is attractive? Instead of going through the door, he turns and follows us. They talk and catch up on each other’s weekends, neither caring that this old man wants to go back inside and see the television.
She finds the brightest spot in the whole damn yard and parks me there, pulling the break on my chair back far enough that I can’t reach the break to loosen it. The light here is more than blinding. I have to close my eyes, which sting behind my lids, and lower my head even more to get a bit of shade. She snaps her fingers in front of me again, calling my name. I don’t take the time to lift my head or to open my eyes.
With no response, she pushes back on my shoulders and then lifts my head so it is tilted to the sun. She’s found the angle in my neck where it sticks, so there is no way escape from the fire burning through my lids.
“There we are.” She sighs happily and I can hear her turn to walk away.
Why do you hate me? I cry, trying to understand the injustice.
The only answer I get is not to me, but to the young man who had followed us out. He has asked my nurse if I am alright. “Of course.” She replied. “Old crabby Mr. Dietz is just asleep, thank God. I hate it when he’s awake because I have to talk to him. He can’t respond, lost his vocal chords to cancer a long time ago, but I swear, the few times I can get him awake enough to look at me, I get the feeling he doesn’t like me.” They both laugh and crunch off on the grass to find shade inside.
Cancer? I never had cancer, did I? I call out to them. Neither comes back, but I am given a reprieve to the sun when what must be a cloud moves over me. The outside breeze is nice, but not as nice as the television screen inside. As I open my eyes to see if there is anything I can see, a droplet of water lands of my cheek. After that comes another until I am soaking wet in the middle of a downpour. I call for help, but no one comes to rescue “old crabby Mr. Dietz.”
