Colder than a

March20, 2013

As I glanced to the left of me I spotted a figure behind a wheelchair on the sidewalk. A thin person holding something in their hand while wrangling a chair in front of them. I hollered out and ran to meet an exceedingly thin woman dressed in a stained long-sleeved powder blue shirt with ragged ends at the wrist. Her summer thread slacks bared wide stripes that hardly held the brittle wind at bay. Her long fingernails stark and white clung to a plastic crinkled cup of some sort of brownish liquid swirling with once crisp squared cubes softly banging the sides of the glass. A long narrow face framed with a smattering of oily fringe led to narrow pitiful green eyes, ragged around the edges. Her mouth responded in a mumble when I inquired about her destination. “At the end of the block,” was all she said. A thin grim line faced away from me as I encouraged her to just sit and take a ride back to her destination. It is bitter cold and my hot tatty breath steamed the back of her head as I whisked the silly woman back home.

We arrived at the end of the city block and she then pointed to the Hi Rise at the dead end of the street! Little did I know I should have brought a snack for the trek. It was a good half mile and I sorely regretted offering my help. I was behind schedule yet could hardly give up in the middle of my kind act for the day. I slipped and slithered along with my stiff ankle wedged in a winter boot, snug in its agony. I got the lightweight wheelchair stuck a number of times, the breathing cadaver sloshed her drink around as she barely lifted her scrawny hinney up off the seat to inch forward. Several times I had to pick up the chair from underneath her increasingly heavier weight to scoot it forward in the built-up snow on the sidewalks edge.

Not such nice conversation was rattling around in my head as I puffed along, avoiding the careening car that didn’t give us a nevermind. A kind truck driver stopped and witnessed my slow progress across the next road which made me keenly aware of just how cold my passenger must be.

The Hi Rise loomed in front of me and I sighed in relief. The thin woman must have profusely spouted her thanks yet her specific words did not register, for after looking her directly in the eye, I was lost in acceptance of compassion and gratitude for my mental and physical capabilities.