In Memoriam: Blue Thunder

Part the Last: Hell

A month after the event, my orthopedic surgeon allowed that it was time to start rehab.

My wife often tells the story of Dead Arm M., who was principal of her middle school. Not wishing to be known as Dead Arm Dave, I decided to give rehab my best shot.

Torture is illegal in this country, except when it's called physical therapy. The racks, iron maidens and water boards have been replaced by treadmills and other seemingly innocuous machines designed to do essentially the same thing--inflict pain.

And so it was with no small amount of trepidation that I met my physical terrorist for the first time. The face-off was like that at the start of a MMA bout. I gave her my best "you are going to rehab me?" look. Her smirk said, "In two days I'll have you crying for your mommy." "Bring it!" I telepathed.

She was wrong. It didn't take her even a day. But I didn't cry in front of her. I just went home, curled up in the fetal position, and stuck my thumb in my mouth. "Wuss," snorted my wife, who had undergone much the same rehab after surgery for a torn rotator cuff. Listen--if God wanted men to experience that kind of pain, they would be having the babies.

Dee, I'll call her, is your average girl-next-door-ish woman. Beneath that feminine exterior, however, lies a penchant for abuse that would make de Sade seem like Mother Teresa (think Gunnery Sergeant Hartman meets Bernardo Gui).

Her first instrument of torture consisted of a length of parachute cord ran through a pully, the ends of which were affixed with wooden hand grips. She told me to sit in a chair and, using my right arm, pull my left arm up as high as it would go. She ordered ten repetitions.

"That's good, Dee. Everyone should have a dream," I laughted apprehensively. Her glare in response told me I should focus on helping her realize her dream instead of trying to be a comedian. I agonized through a couple of reps and moved my left arm two inches. Maybe.

Next was "table dusting," a sort of wax on, wax off exercise, where I was to use my left arm to move a dishtowel up and down, back and forth, clockwise and counter-clockwise 20 times each.

"What, you don't have cleaners to do this stuff?" I asked. Dee (think Capt Lewis meets Irina Spalko) was not amused.

The killer was next. Using my fingers, I was to walk my left arm up a wall and back down ten times. I managed two or three, and the agony was brutal.

Other torture devices included sticks, elastic bands, machines and isometrics. But the kicker was, I had to do two-a-days, whether in the torture chamber or at home.

One day I made the mistake of saying, "Well, that exercise was nothing." "Really?" Dee (think Nurse Ratched meets Annie Wilkes) replied, with a grin the Joker would have envied. "Well, then, do this one." I should have kept my mouth shut.

I've been enduring this torture for about ten weeks. I'm sleeping in my bed now, can shower and shave, dress myself, tie my shoes, use my left arm to operate the car's turn signal, and clean the pool. And yes, I know--I owe it all to Dee (think Florence Nightingale meets Clara Barton).

I suspect Blue Thunder has been repaired by now. Someone else is probably riding him around one 'hood or another. I miss him.

Repairs to Blue Thunder: $565.
Repairs to me: $25k and counting.
A wife who had my back: Priceless.

In Memoriam: Blue Thunder

Part II: Purgatory

Note: For those of you who may wonder why I wrote Part I in the third person, allow me to explain. See, like Brett Favre, I have an evil twin. Brett's evil twin shows up towards the end of a playoff game and throws an interception to end his team's season. He's done that about six years in a row. My evil twin also does stupid stuff and then leaves me to suffer the consequences. I've been describing for you, then, the actions of my evil twin. Surely you don't think I would have done this to myself, do you? Well, do you? Anyway, having done his worst, he has fled the scene.

I wasn't sure exactly what had happened, only that something was terribly amiss. I was getting to my feet when the driver of the SUV asked me if I needed an ambulance. I stood up, wondered why I would need an ambulance, and said no thanks. I remember I helped up Blue Thunder and actually tried to start it. I couldn't. Somehow I managed to push it out of the street and onto the driveway of a vacant house.

A car approached and slowed, and that driver asked if I needed an ambulance. What, did I look like I needed an ambulance? I was up and moving around. I needed no stinking ambulance. No thanks, I told him.

I began walking back towards home, some 10 blocks or so away. Only then did I realize I was cradling my left arm with my right. I was also doing a Ratso Rizzo limp. I began to wonder if I could make it home when I saw my wife driving towards me, a look of abject terror on her face, the same look she gets when she spots a "palmetto bug" (translate: roach) in the bathtub.

"What happened?" she asked.

"Blue Thunder took a little spill," I replied, figuring if I minimized the event I would save myself my wife's wrath. Actually, it would be days before I finally was able to work out what had happened and place the blame where it belonged--right on the shoulders of my evil twin.

We're going to the emergency room," she decreed. "You do realize you're still wearing your helmet, don't you?"

A CAT scan revealed a fractured shoulder and a broken foot. My knee was intact but had an abrasion the size of Lake Erie that looked like a piece of filleted fish. My upper inner arm was the color of a blackboard. I was patched up and sent home with instructions to see an orthopedic surgeon. The orthopedic surgeon put my arm in a sling and my foot in a walking boot. I gazed upon myself and saw that I was decidedly not cool.

Still, it could have been worse. A few days after the event, I checked my helmet and found a couple of dings. But for it and my religious fervor over wearing it, I could have suffered a skull fracture.

Later, I had to have the nail on my big toe removed. An ultrasound revealed a blood clot in my left leg. I had to administer two-a-day shots to my abdomen. Three weeks and 42 shots later, it looked like Clay Matthews and A. J. Hawk had been tap dancing on it while wearing cleats. The granddaughter wanted to know if she could play connect-the-dots on me. No sympathy.

I had once taken a womb-to-the-tomb psych course. Apparently upon reaching old age, seniors begin regressing. I experienced that phenomena in a different context. No longer could I bathe myself, dress, or tie my shoes. I slept on a futon, and later on my recliner, and used a gallon water jug for a bedpan. I watched helplessly as the swimming pool turned into the Black Lagoon.

I've always said that while men want to be husbands, women want to be mothers. Now was my wife's second opportunity to self-actualize, and she assumed the role in a manner that guaranteed her sainthood. She turned what could have been a catastrophe of biblical proportions into little more than a minor inconvenience.

Surprisingly throughout, as long as I kept my upper left arm immobile, there was very little pain. That was yet to come.

To be continued. . . .

In Memoriam: Blue Thunder

Part I: Heaven

He remembered when he was a kid and had once substituted as paperboy for a buddy, using his buddy's motor scooter. He remembered that it was cool.

Decades later, retired and living in Florida, he donated his ten-year-old Saturn to the sheriff's Boy's Ranch. He and his wife thus became a one-car family. He noticed an increase in the number of folks riding motor scooters, and thought it would be a super, neat-o, peachy-keen idea to purchase one for himself. After all, there was no reason for him to stay home while his wife was out doing church things, mother-daughter things, grandmother-granddaughter things.

So he went shopping. He found just the perfect 50 cc scooter, large enough to get himself around town without having to jump through $300-plus hoops to obtain a motorcycle endorsement for his driver's license. The scooter was blue, of course, with some really neat detailing and a fanny pack on back. He gazed upon it and saw that it was cool.

Before he took delivery he stopped at Wal-Mart and bought a plain black motorcycle helmet. He had a decal of the wings he had earned in the Air Force, and he attached it to the helmet. He asked a buddy who lived in Colorado Springs to go to the Air Force Academy and purchase for him a pair of decals of the lightning bolts which adorn the Falcons' football helmets. He attached those to the helmet, along with a decal of the Air Force logo. And on the back he attached a decal of the rank he held when he retired. He gazed upon the helmet and saw that it was cool.

He thought about buying a motorcycle jacket, the kind with spikes on the shoulders and a skull on the back, and a pair of motorcycle boots to wear in colder weather. He fantasized about riding over to the local burger joint for biker day, but his wife suggested that if he showed up over there on a scooter while wearing Hell's Angels garb they would beat him up for his spending money. So he settled for a flight jacket with a neck scarf that blew behind him in his wake turbulence. He gazed at his shadow as he sped along and saw that it was cool.

He bought a license plate frame that announced his affiliation with the Air Force and attached a "Retired Air Force" decal on the fanny pack. He named his scooter Blue Thunder.

"You should have named it El Toro," said his wife.

"What, after a bull?" he asked.

"No, after the lawn mower it sounds like."

For 18 months he rode it to the movies, to his volunteer jobs at the Elks lodge and St Pete General, to meet his wife at her church or at their favorite beach restaurant for lunch, to the library, grocery, carry-out, mall, bookstore, or wherever. And he saw that it was really cool.

Until January 2, 2011. It was Sunday morning, and he was scheduled to cashier breakfast at the lodge. His wife offered to drop him off on her way to church, but he wanted to take Blue Thunder for a ride. He went through his pre-flight checklist, kicked the tires and lit the fires, used his key chain remote to raise the garage door, and off he went.

It had drizzled all night and the pavement was wet. He was following an SUV as he approached a speed bump. Speed bumps were for cars, he thought, not for scooters. So he started around the bump, concentrating on avoiding the curb.

When he looked up he saw that the SUV had slowed to practically nothing to turn into a driveway. He grabbed the brake hand levers, and the scooter immediately stopped. He didn't.

To be continued. . . .