The old man struggles as he puts on his olive green winter coat. A recent steroid injection and two weeks of high-dose Prednisone lessened the arthritic pain in his right shoulder, but pain and debility remain. Eventually, the old man wrestles his coat into compliance, puts on his matching fedora, and heads for the front door.
The old man stops at the door, ensuring Petey, the Ferret — a year-old cat — doesn’t dash towards it. Petey thinks freedom awaits if he can just get out the door, but the old man knows cars, injury, and death await instead.
No ornery cat today. No hollering at Petey as he tests his “freedom.” The old man starts the car with his key fob. A heated seat and steering wheel await him as he drags his right leg and then his left into the driver’s compartment. The old man stopped driving four years ago, but his partner’s knee replacement forced him back into service. Short drives, such as this one, are fine, but longer drives, say to Fort Wayne or Toledo, challenge the old man’s cognitive and physical abilities.
The old man backs out on the road, puts the car in gear, and heads for the local high school for a basketball game. The old man loves high school basketball and to a lesser degree football. The local school district gives residents sixty-five and older a free pass to school events, so the only cost today will be the money the old man spends at the concession stand.
The local high school, five miles away, sits on U.S. Hwy 127. Other area schools took advantage of cheap money from the state of Ohio to build new buildings over the past two decades, but not the old man’s school district. The area is dominated by white Republican farmers, and the local school district’s attempt to pass a new building levy failed several times. Eventually, a maintenance levy was passed, covering building and property renovations and improvements. The old man appreciates having the lowest real estate taxes in rural northwest Ohio; however, he can’t help but wonder how wise it was to spend millions of dollars fixing up buildings when that money could have been used to replace a sixty-year-old facility with a state-of-the-art school plant.
The old man pulls into the school parking lot, seeing a handicapped parking spot next to the front door. “Awesome,” the old man says to himself. He has on more than one occasion had to park far from the front door, resulting in exhaustion by the time he enters the school. Walking short distances exhausts him too, but less exhaustion is always good, so the old man is hopeful that tonight is a “less pain” night.
The old man walks into the building, past the ticket taker (who knows he has a pass), 50/50 drawing, and athletic booster’s table, and into the gymnasium. He nods and smiles at fellow basketball fans, as he makes his way to half-court. The old man tries to always sit in the same place, two or three rows up from floor level. Navigating the stairs proves challenging, so the old man tries to sit as close to the hardcourt as possible.
As is his custom, the old man arrives at the game an hour before start time. Doing so allows him to take a deep breath and situate himself in the stands, making sure people aren’t sitting close enough to him to inflict pain. Arriving early is very much part of the old man’s DNA. Earlier this year, the varsity basketball coach, the old man’s neighbor, asked why he arrived so early to the games. The old man replied, “When my partner and I first married, we drove junk automobiles. Flat tires were common. So, when going somewhere, we always left early enough to change a tire if we had a flat. The habit stuck, so I tend to be early for e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g.”
Situated in his seat, the old man watches as the junior varsity game begins. An hour and a half later, he haltingly stands, removes his hat, and sings the Star Spangled Banner before the start of the varsity game.
The stands are packed. The old man took 20 mg of hydrocodone before he left home, and now he takes 20 mg more, hoping to lessen the pain he feels rising in his body from head to toe. Pain-free is never an option, but hopefully, narcotic pain meds will reduce the pain enough that the game becomes a pleasant distraction.
Not long after the start of the varsity game, the old man feels a sudden jolt to his whole body. His seat is on the aisle just in case he needs to suddenly use the bathroom or leave. Up and down the aisle run three elementary-aged children, jumping up on the seat above him, and then down to the aisle, causing the old man’s seat to bounce up and down, jolting his body with excruciating pain.
The old man doesn’t blame the kids. “Kids will be kids,” he tells himself. “If these were my grandchildren, they would be doing the same.” The old man, however, does blame parents. “Children should be taught not to jump/run in the stands; that the stands aren’t for play.”
By the time, the game ends in a three-point loss for the home team, the old man has been repeatedly abused by running, jumping, and laughing children. He haltingly stands, and once the aisle is clear, he makes his way to the floor. Leaving the gym, he retraces the steps back to his car. Ice had fallen since he arrived, covering the windshield. The old man starts the car turns on the defroster, and retrieves the ice scraper from the trunk. Once the windshield is ice-free, the old man returns home, stopping first at the post office to get the mail.
Coat off, shoes, off, hat off, clothes switched for sweat pants and a tee shirt, the old man walks to the living room and flops on the couch. His partner asks her typical questions: How was the game? Who won? How do you feel? Questions answered, the old man tells his partner about the running, jumping children, a story she has heard countless times before. She feels sorry for the love of her life, knowing that there is little she can do for him.
Several days later the old man recounts his week to his therapist, telling her, “Maybe I should have stayed home, but I am in pain whether I go to the game or not, so I might as well go. Pain is ever with me, and unless I want to be a recluse, I must force myself to get out of the house, knowing it is good for me.”
The old man knows he can’t keep people from killing him one step, one jump, and one bang at a time. No matter how carefully he manages his environment, those around him are unaware of his struggle with chronic, unrelenting pain. He looks like the typical grandpa, but unless those around him carefully read his face, they will never know how much pain he is in. This is his burden to bear, and if he wants to enjoy what life he has left, this is the price of admission he must pay.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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I’m not as bad a shape as you, Bruce, but with fibro, I get it. Take care of yourself. ❤️