Observations©

By Donald S. Conkey

Date: March 8, 2007 - # 910 – Has Spring Sprung?  (807)

On Wednesday morning, February 21, I woke to the sound of heavy rain outside. Rising, I lit the fireplace to remove the chill before wheeling to the front door where I opened it and just sat there filling my lungs with those wondrous smells that followed the rain that ended winter’s long drab cold winter days.

            Sitting in my wheel chair, continuing to fill my winter weary lungs with the freshness of spring, I looked around and observed that spring had sprung and was actively trying to “spring up.” One could almost see the sap rising in the tree trunks, flowing to the branches and twigs and activating the buds that are now beginning to leaf out.

Another one of nature’s stunning scenes greeted me while looking across the street at the seventh tee of our local golf course. It was shrouded in fog. The warm rain was falling on the cold almost frozen fairway and creating the fog. And through the fog I could hear the mournful coos of the morning doves. Enchanting. Equally exhilarating were the beautiful melodies of the other birds sent, it seemed to me, to serenade me in my wheel chair while pondering the beauty that was engulfing me.

That was nearly three weeks ago. But I have had ample time since then, being wheel chair bound, to ponder those special spring scenes and sounds and each time I ponder them I am strongly reminded of why we moved here in 1995. We love it here in Eagle Watch and this house has met our aging needs up until now. But my recent accident changed our aging priorities.

Our home is situated on one of the few flat yards (a must for a heart patient) in Eagle Watch, with a wooded backyard that provides sufficient cover for a wide variety of wild life that, almost daily, entertain us with their version of a wild life theater.

Not only are we surrounded by nature, and nature’s beauty, but we are surrounded by friends, good friends, friends who have stepped in during our current time of need and provided us with fabulous meals three days a week for five weeks, with other friends stepped in to help with a variety of other needs. Eagle Watch is both beautiful and friendly.

But the accident forced us to seriously face the reality of aging. When we moved here we tried to buy a home with a bedroom on the main floor but such homes were scarce so we settled for this home with its unique community and charm. But now a “master-on-the-main” is not a choice, it’s a necessity.

Adjusting a wheel-chair hospital-bed patient to the main floor, with its half bath, and no shower has been challenging. Taking a bath at the kitchen sink, standing on one leg, is not fully refreshing. While taking these stand up baths I remembered the washtub baths mother gave her children in the thirties with the water heated on the top of a pot bellied stove used to heat their home. How priorities change.

Joan, with the help of family members and church friends, was able to rearrange the main floor to accommodate a hospital bed. But accessing the bathroom proved to be harder. The bathroom door, too narrow for the wheel chair, required us to adjust. Our adjustments included the use of an old fashioned “chamber pot,” one similar to those used by my grandparents over a hundreds years ago. While daily use of a chamber pot was common to them, and taken for granted by their generation in pre-bathroom days, it was a new experience for us – a sobering experience. We were beginning to see aging has its own unique challenges and that we were going to have to make changes, major changes. 

Our choices boiled down to: sell this home and buy a home with a “master-on-the-main” or add a “master-on-the-main” to this house. It was a no-brainer. We didn’t want to leave our home, our neighborhood, our wonderful friends, our flat wooded yard, or our furry and winged friends that provide us daily wild life theater entertainment. We also decided we are too old to move again.

Our new master-on-the-main will be senior friendly. Everything in it will be the latest equipment to serve our aging needs, a walk in bath, wheel chair friendly, and raised commodes.

As the county’s senior population continues to grow it will be important those aging seniors realize, as we were forced to do, that aging has an entirely new unique set of challenges. The sooner they realize that retirement is not all golden the quicker they will be able to adjust when reality sets it, as it did with us on December 27, 2006, the day our world dramatically changed due to an unprepared for “age-related-accident.”