Counting Blessings After a Hard Year

It was a banner year for me.

Although I lost some physical skills--for example, I can no longer figure skate nor tie a necktie--I learned how to handle a wheelchair and how to walk with a cane.

Always new horizons.

I believe I experienced some intellectual development, also. I read a book every night after television and relearned many words I had forgotten.

My wife and I saw some wonderful movies: “Casablanca,” “For Whom the Bell Tolls” and “The Best Years of Our Lives” among them.

I made several new professional acquaintances--a neurologist, a plastic surgeon, an orthopedist, a podiatrist and an audiologist. The neurologist diagnosed my Parkinson’s disease, the dermatologist diagnosed my skin cancer and the plastic surgeon excised it. The orthopedist put a cast on my broken wrist, the podiatrist attended to my broken ankle, the audiologist fitted me with hearing aids.

I also became friends with an athletic young physical therapist named Kathy Doubleday, who comes to my house twice a week to give me a workout. She looks like a college cheerleader.

Also among the new friends I’ve acquired is Sylvia Carter, who stays with me when my wife is at work and drives me to my various doctors’ appointments. Sylvia also fixes my breakfast and sometimes goes out to lunch with me. Sylvia is from Belize. She speaks with a lovely accent and calls me “Zhock.” Sometimes in the car, she sings along with the radio.

The reason we have Sylvia is that I am impetuous and my wife is afraid that I will try to walk around the house without assistance and break something else. I have already broken that ankle and the wrist--and I seem to have damaged a rotator cuff in my left shoulder, so that it gives me excruciating pain when I try to put on or take off a shirt. It’s the same kind of injury Orel Hershiser had. However, since I’m not a pitcher it doesn’t matter that much.

During this year, my relationship with my wife became stronger than ever. Wherever I go, she has to walk on my right side, holding me by the arm. Otherwise, I tend to fall.

She also dresses and undresses me because I can’t handle the subtle movements required. Also, I can’t button a shirt or get into a coat or tie my shoelaces. It takes about as long to dress me as it must have taken to dress Queen Victoria.

She also takes me to the bathroom. This becomes an embarrassing problem when I have to go in a public place, such as a restaurant. Sometimes she simply commandeers the room until I have finished.

Assisting me when I walk has caused one problem. She says I have a tendency to crowd her off to the right, so that she is always bumping into walls or furniture, and once or twice I almost shoved her into our swimming pool.

Besides escorting me, she has to prepare my pills and insulin shots four times a day. I give the shots to myself, but she has to get them ready. I have a bedside bell that I ring when I need her.

As I’ve said, this has brought us closer together. Perhaps too close. I sometimes think she resents it when I ring the bell, but she never says anything but, “What is it?”

Sylvia has also been trained to respond to my bell. Sometimes I need her to bring me a Coke or turn a newspaper page. Since breaking my left wrist, I have been unable to turn the pages. It is impossible to do with one hand.

My two daughters-in-law have been wonderful. Gail, the physical therapist, has furnished me with a basket full of marbles that I am supposed to pick up between the thumb and fingers of my hand, now that the cast is off. She has also given me a ball of putty that I am supposed to work in my hand to strengthen the wrist and the fingers.

A couple of days before Christmas, the two of them took me to Bullock’s Pasadena to buy a Christmas present for my wife. Before shopping, we had lunch in the tearoom. My French daughter-in-law, Jackie, and I each had a glass of Chardonnay, but my Italian daughter-in-law, Gail, the designated driver, abstained.

We had no sooner started through the store than I saw a gray-green pantsuit with a mandarin collar. “That’s it!” I said at once.

My wife wore it on Christmas night. She looked beautiful. I haven’t lost my touch.

I’m a lucky man to have such a family. As for New Year’s resolutions, I have only the same old one:

Try to keep on living and see what happens next.

* Jack Smith’s column is published Mondays.

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