This fall was a bad one
It might have been the impact, or the adrenaline spiking my body temperature, but my effort to even sit upright falters. I resignedly lie back in the middle of the road and look up at the sky. Nearby, cars stop with urgency. I know, instantly, that this fall was a bad one.
I know that my view of myself piloting my wheelchair, the Rocinante, is dangerously quixotic. I love the vision of myself as something of an extreme sportswoman, flying downhill, skidding around corners, chasing the high. But that view of myself makes me a little too comfortable with risk, possibly even reckless. I think the closer I am to trouble the more invincible I feel, and that pushes me to try ever more dangerous feats of wheelchairing. I'm wheeling on a new route today. This one is just over 10k and navigates in a full circle around the city. The first couple of kilometres are uphill beside a busy road.
And it is here that disaster finds me.
I wheel on a pavement beside the road. It is narrow but passable and I don't feel at risk even with the cars flying past nearby. The pavement ends at a wooded offroad trail. The problem is how the pavement ends. There is no curb cut. The pavement ends in a curved drop to the road. The autumn leaves obscure the edge and I know deep down it would be risky to attempt it. But that vigilant part of myself draws her sword and we approach the curb with confidence, caution, and control.
And we fail.
The left wheel slips on the leaves and plunges off the edge of the pavement, leaving the right wheel behind with me sitting at an angle. For a brief moment I think I might be safe, tilting but stable. I roll my eyes and consider how to proceed.
The chair tips.
The chair tipping sideways is a crisis. There is no way to compensate, no way to rescue yourself, and it’s a long way down. I become a total passenger as the chair falls and throws me into a busy road. I land hard on my left side and roll onto my back.
The workout, the adrenaline, piques my body temperature and I lose core motor function. I test my movements but can’t sit up. So I lie in the road for a moment, the Roci prone nearby.
Cars stop, men rush out and hurry over to me.
With time I could cool down, find the strength to rise independently. But I'm in the road. Cars can't pass me. I need to move now and even the vigilant part of me knows we can’t do this alone.
Multiple Sclerosis forces you to become someone new constantly and today I don't recognise myself. For all my strength and strident independence, for all the belligerence and defiance, for all my quixotic idealism, when I hit that road I find that I am suddenly totally helpless.
I keep a mind to my voice. Especially when I‘m this vulnerable I can't let anyone spot that I'm trans. Even spontaneous moans of pain need to be in a femme register. Intersectionality threatens to hit me harder than the tarmac.
A kind man finds me, reaches down to help me off the ground. I put my arm around his neck and he lifts but it becomes clear to us both that my legs will not function and he can't lift my dead weight alone. He calls to a stranger. I put one arm around each of them and they lift me wholesale into the air, my legs dangling. I have never been carried before and I giggle my surprise as they lift me back into my seat.
I’m hit with a weird sequence of emotional reactions in succession. I first feel grateful. I can’t believe two strangers have put hands on me so quickly, eschewing social norms to rescue me. They are so careful, so thoughtful, they check in with me, and there’s no doubt in my mind, as my legs dangle uselessly beneath me, that they are saving me. Against my better judgement being lifted by strong men is also… oddly affirming. I know it’s not the most feminist act to play into the ‘damsel in distress’ trope but… it was kind of awesome, what do you want from me? I also feel suddenly deeply vulnerable. I’m being lifted into the air, and if these kind men put me down on a log rather than my chair then I’m staying sat on that log for a while. I know they’re not going to put me on a log… but they could… and that’s a lot of control to relinquish.
And I feel like a fool. It is nothing but fortune that no cars were passing when I fell into the road. Today I was in real danger of serious injury. Today, I really fucked up.
Back at the helm of the Rocinante I feel my freedom again. I explain how this happens from time to time, thank my heroes profusely, and get myself and my ship back into shape.
In one sense I'm proud that I didn't decline the help of these kind heroes. And I'm so deeply grateful that they moved so quickly, so selflessly, to help that I'm misty just thinking about it.
In a whole other sense I'm relieved that these amazing people didn't clock that I was trans. I know that shouldn't matter but it does. If, while carrying this helpless woman, these kind men clocked me, I don't know what would happen next. This is a low level anxiety experienced by all trans people, I’ve no doubt, but when two men are within inches of your face that fear becomes acute quickly.
There’s also a defiance. That curb should have had a curb cut, it’s a path people commonly use. That it didn’t have one left me with a difficult choice of turning on a dime and wheeling back down the hill to a curb cut, crossing the road, and then climbing the same hill and crossing again further up, or attempting to wheel down the curb.