Do I or do I not resemble an awfully large flamingo here (click to enlarge)?
Want to know what I was looking at? Voilà (again, click to enlarge):
Do you recognize this building? If you are an American history buff or, like me, merely an arts geek, perhaps you have visited here. It's "The Old Manse," in Concord, Massachusetts, where the adorable Hawthornes, Nathaniel and Sophia (née Peabody), spent their three-year honeymoon, 'til they ticked off the landlord, Ralph Waldo Emerson. (Was it another woman? Or was it the rent? Get the gossip here. Okay, so it's 150-year-old Transcendentalist gossip, hardly "Page Six" or "E! Online." It has the advantage, though, of actually being interesting.)
Notice the texture and slope of the lawn in this second picture. Notice that I am standing, in the first picture, with neither cane nor crutch nor other supportive device, far away from my loving photographer, and also near the bottom of this lawn, near the boathouse on the Concord River. There is a boathouse near my home where one can rent canoes very reasonably, then row up to the Old Manse and picnic there, or roam around the grounds of this or the battle site at the Old North Bridge next door. We plan to do just this very thing the next time the sun shines reliably here on a Saturday.
But on this day, July 3, 2006, how did I get to this place? How did I manage to cross unsupported this deeply sloping, uneven, rolling lawn, me with the mechanical leg, the boring, analog kind without the built-in stabilizers? Why, I walked, of course. I walked on my own two feet (okay, one of them is an obvious replacement, but still mine), without any help, without even watching my step.
Yes, thank you, it did take a couple of years of hard and careful work incorporated into every walking and standing moment of my daily life to reach this level of competence, and yes, for a couple of months a couple of years ago, I did have Tricia, the awesome PT who set me up on my path to this with a smart, strong foundation of understanding. And yes, yes, yes, if your condition is not markedly more complicated than mine, there is no reason you cannot reach this point -- and further -- if you wish. And I strongly encourage you to try.
If your situation is more complicated, however, maybe you will need more help. I am here to tell you that, if you live in Massachusetts, help is available! You do not need to sit on your bum all summer! Well, okay, maybe you do, but you don't need to do it indoors! You can get out and have literarily and historically themed outdoor adventures, too!
I'm not interested in kayaking, personally. I'm big and fat and claustrophobic, and the idea of being contained like that skeeves me out. I really like canoes. Kayaks, though, have the advantage of greater maneuverability. And now, thanks to the Massachusetts Department of Conservation's Universal Access Program and All Out Adventures, disabled Massachusetts residents and their friends and families can learn to kayak this summer on Walden Pond, for just five bucks a head. Can you think of a better place to learn? Click one of the links in this paragraph to learn more, or call 413-527-8980 before August 14, 2006, to pre-register.
If you click one of the links, you will also learn that there is a wide variety of other outdoor sports and activities available through this program year-round, including canoeing. I find this very exciting. Personally, I've been meaning to get back to ice skating for years, assumed I'd have to give it up forever after my transfemoral amputation, but now am not so sure. I probably won't be waltz-jumping anytime soon, but this winter I might just start recreationally falling on my ass on frozen water again for the first time in decades. When that happens, I'll definitely post pictures.
If you don't live in Massachusetts yet yearn to get out and have similar adventures, I strongly encourage you to visit your state or country's website and see if it has a department of parks and recreation and/or a department of conservation, too. I'd be willing to bet it does. I'd be willing to bet that there are lots of programs like this, at least in the US and Canada. I'd love to hear about any you discover.
And if there isn't anything like this near you, maybe you can get on the phone and see what you can start yourself. I'd love to hear about that, too.
Now I must get out again myself, right now, this minute, out into today's too-rare, breezy sunshine. The bees are in the hyssop, and I have ripe tomatoes and no good excuses. Good luck, and happy adventuring!
Congratulations and my god that looks fun!
Posted by: Melissa B. | July 26, 2006 at 12:20 PM
Oh, Melissa, so so SO fun, really.
When I call the Hawthornes adorable, I am not kidding. Not only were they both pretty to look at, but passionately in love their entire marriage long. Sophia, an artist and diarist (the blogger-equivalent of her own time), scratched notes in the window panes of the Old Manse with the diamond in her engagement ring. One marks her sadness coping with a miscarriage her first year of marriage. Another marks her first baby Una's observations out the same window, so beautifully and tenderly it squeezes tears right out of your stomach. (I am almost choking to death thinking about it.) In another window upstairs, she and Nathaniel etched an entire conversation with each other using the same ring.
The Hawthornes may have left the Manse under some kind of cloud (something you will probably not hear of during the Trustees' guided tour, which mostly focuses on romantic and wonderful things like the restored vegetable garden Henry David Thoreau planted out front for the Hawthornes as a wedding present), but those etched windows are still there. One of the Ripley/Emerson wives and/or daughters (Sarah Ripley, I think -- yay Sara(h)s everywhere!) insisted no one replace them, ever.
Now, if you think this looks like fun, wait 'til I photograph and post our next canoe trip. (Heck, wait 'til you see what I did today.) Or, come visit sometime, maybe next time you get sent to Boston for work, and I will show you all of it in person.
Posted by: Sara | July 26, 2006 at 04:47 PM
Dang. Grafitti ain't what it used to be.
And doesn't all that lawn look lush!
Posted by: Ron Sullivan | July 28, 2006 at 01:11 AM
Yes, Ron, that is the advantage of a summer of dumping rain: lush lawns. Lush everything, really. So very much green.
Posted by: Sara | July 28, 2006 at 09:29 AM
Love that Transcendentalist gossip. I MUST set aside a day to explore that house.
Posted by: patry | July 28, 2006 at 10:16 AM
Oh, yes, Patry, you must, you really, really must.
Also, it will please you to know that on the day when these photos were taken, several people were blatantly loitering about the property. One did have a notebook. Another, a barefoot youngish man with longish hair, sat on a low stone wall playing his guitar.
We are really quite serious about our loitering in this town.
Posted by: Sara | July 28, 2006 at 10:27 AM
I do like a town that encourages loitering, as it's one of my chief talents. I mean, here I am loitering when I'm supposed to be finishing something whose deadline was um yesterday, wasn't it.
Posted by: Ron Sullivan | July 29, 2006 at 12:46 PM
Well, Ron, as a fellow loitering afficionado, you might at some point want to take a leisurely stroll over to Patry's place where she has posted a most delightful essay all about it.
And now I must scurry to dress so we can go out and have our usual Saturday lunch 'n' loiter outing. After a brilliant, dramatic thunder and lightning storm last night which played merry hell with traffic all around eastern New England and even downed a steeple in Portsmouth, NH, it's another gorgeous rain-free day. Plus, we are on a mission to secure a picnic basket so we can go canoeing tomorrow. Yes, we do need a picnic basket in order to do that.
Posted by: Sara | July 29, 2006 at 01:03 PM
OK, take the List Five Weird Things About Yourself meme along too. I got tagged and now I'm tagging you.
Posted by: Ron Sullivan | August 02, 2006 at 09:19 PM
Why, Ron, there is nothing "weird" about me. Nothing at all. I would think that would be obvious.
(Tell my cat to stop laughing. I'm serious.)
Posted by: Sara | August 03, 2006 at 06:49 AM