Victorious Struggle

This mural is of a friend, Jamie Scholl, who was totally paralyzed by polio from the chest down. It was incredible as a boy to see him get up in his crutches and braces for his body was limp as a gummy doll.

Starting from the left, Jamie uses his hands to lift his right leg into braces. His left leg is laying off to the side later to be picked up, and fastened also at the thigh, knee, chin, and foot, between two aluminum rods that makes up his braces. He locks his braces in a straight-legged position so his knees to bend.

Once his paralyzed limbs are securely strapped and locked in braces as stiff as splints, Jamie tries to turn on his stomach. But his legs remain on their back side because of no muscle tone in his mid section that is so elastic that his body is twisted in two parts. So as the next figure shows, he uses his hand to flip his legs over.

In the third picture, he pushes until the toes of his shoes get enough traction on the floor to jack knife his rear end upward. His back, again from the paralyzing disease, collapses and folds like an accordion into an arch that makes it more difficult for my friend to get up.

Although he doesn't have a single working muscle in his skinny legs because of the invention of braces makes it half way up. Now, my friend faces the challenge of getting up the rest of the way. It is a challenge since his back is still limply arched, and his trunk is deadweight in being almost as weak as his legs. So as in the fourth figure, he grabs one of his crutches and plants it up side down. This enables him to push his upper body up a little bit. Then, he reaches for his second crutch.

Jamie's left arm pushes himself up further. This helps him to plant his other crutch so he can climb up more. Inch by inch, he climbs further using his crutches as a ladder.

He then sticks his crutch under his armpit for more stable support. Next, he turns the other one right side up so he can climb further as in the second to the last painting. Though he is almost all the way up, his limply arched back and stomach still sags to the law of gravity. As in the whole mural, his buffed and muscular upper body is contrasted with his weak lifeless thin legs.

But Jamie makes it all the way up and stands as in the last figure. He is ready to walk by raising and swinging his legs, in front of his crutches for a step. He pushes his body forward with his crutches and brings them in front to repeat the amazingly rapid ongoing cycle that he does naturally and effortlessly.

This mural would be perfect in a lobby of a doctor's office or a rehabilitation facility.