Friends Helping Friends

This is a symbolic scene of me helping my friend, Jamie, up off the ground after his braces broke that I described in my autobiography, “More Than A Watchmaker.”

In the eighth grade, I saw Jamie was the last straggler to leave the room and had more difficulty walking or hopping along than usual. He was dragging his left leg with his small shoe pointing the opposite way he was going. I knew from wearing braces myself that his were broken at the hip joint. Though one leg dragged in back, he hopped slower than usual but with confidence because both knees were locked straight by his braces. He stepped on some rain-tracked water on the floor. Because his hip was unsupported,

He dove suddenly to the ground with two hands in front. His crutches flew in scattered directions and made a crashing sound. The noise forced the effects of my cerebral palsy to clinch my eyes shut. When I opened them, I saw he landed sitting up. One leg was spread in front and the other one laid behind him. Apparently, he didn't get hurt by the fall, nor did the seeming awkward position of his legs doing the splits bother him one bit. Jamie yelled, "Hey, Timmy! Help me!" He thought his friend was still close and could hear his plea for assistance. He listened intently for a response without changing the uncomfortable looking position in which he was actually able to rest

"Oh, fudge," the polio victim, said. He realized Timmy didn't hear him and he were stuck in the room with just me. If I were he, I would have waited until the assistant teacher came back. But he had to do the main speech that day and didn't want to wait for help. His hands lobbed the back leg in front for the first step. Though Jamie could still walk in broken braces, it was another question if he could pick himself up as usual. I thought Jamie sprawled on the floor was just as helpless as me. I wondered how he was going to get out of this one.

Nevertheless, he attempted to get up by flopping to his stomach, turning his bottom section with his hands. He pushed and jack-knifed his body just half way up. However, his left leg slid out from underneath him and helplessly strayed anywhere gravity flung it. His hip offered no support for his weight. He tried three times-- always falling down again.

Finally in disgust, Jamie gathered his two crutches. Then, he tossed them to where I helplessly sat in my wheelchair ten feet away, goggling.

"I'm going to use your chair to pull myself up," he said angrily and dragged himself to me. From pulling himself toward me, his legs that laid again in splits gradually came together-- a taunting reminder of how little he had to work with.

Once by my chair, he took one crutch in one hand and grabbed my armrest with the other to vigorously pull up his limp body. I felt the steady, shivering pressure of his bearing weight on my chair, as he didn't trust his braces to do so. He was standing up, but his other crutch that he needed was still on the floor. "Now was what he going to do?" I thought.

After his hand securely planted his troublesome leg, he kept holding my chair to support most of his weight. Simultaneously, he bent over to pick up his other crutch. Then, he used the ladder technique with two crutches and my armrest to climb up again. This is a true sense of friends helping friends!