Author: Tony Trott
When the incident in this blog occurred, I knew right away that I had a good blog. I wasn’t quite sure how to start it though! This happened a week or so ago, and despite thinking about it since, I didn’t come up with a great or clever opening, so I guess I’ll just jump in!
A friend was having a milestone birthday, and so a bunch of people were gathering at a bar in Washington, DC (easily accessible by subway) to celebrate. The gathering was fun and enjoyable, but we decided to leave a little bit early to get home at a reasonable hour. It was a nice night out, but the sidewalks were less-crowded than I expected which is nice for this scooter-user as it means I don’t have to pay as strict attention to the sidewalk as usual.
I imagine most of you are probably thinking to yourselves, ‘Not paying strict attention while driving a scooter is not a good thing even if not at full speed’ and you are correct. Although I was not at full speed, I admit I was too close to the edge of the sidewalk. I’m sure you see where this is going, the front of my scooter went off the edge.
Of course, this got my attention quickly, but there was nothing I could do to reverse the event already in motion. So, in short, I just went off the sidewalk. Fortunately, my head did not come into contact with concrete. If there is anything that Friedreich’s Ataxia improves, it’s your ability to fall without getting hurt; not that you never get hurt when you fall. But I digress! So, I didn’t physically get hurt other than a scrape on one of my elbows, but I needed to get out of the street before any cars came by! As I sat up and told my wife I was OK, a couple of guys came running up to help me. One picked up my scooter and put it back on the sidewalk, and the second put his arms under my arms and lifted me up to a standing position. After the first guy was finished getting my scooter on the sidewalk, he grabbed my ankles and together both guys lifted me back into my scooter.
After a few minutes of reassuring them I was OK, I tried to get my scooter to go forward, but it wouldn’t move. My mind started racing, thinking about how we’d get home. By now a few other people had stopped to help, including a nurse presumably from the nearby George Washington University Hospital who was on her way home after her shift. Finally, I just decided to turn the power off on the scooter and leave It off for about a minute and when I turned it back on the scooter worked! So we said some quick thank yous and goodbyes and then left as soon as possible. I was nervous every time I had to stop my scooter, but fortunately it started up every time and we made it home!
I remembered watching, recently, an old episode of the Simpsons (Season 4, episode 2) in which Marge sang a song called “the Kindness of Strangers.” That was exactly what I received!
