Published: 20 Jan 2020
So, our explorations went really well. We found getting around the property fun. I showed Josh where I wanted a garden of my own, something between a formal Japanese garden and a casual New England flower and kitchen garden, with some fish in a pond. We went over to the sheds next, these were really workrooms and you could tell that Ron would be making good use of them, he already had the excess wood purchased for the ramp stored where it would be handy for him to utilize when the time came to use it. There were workbenches and power outlets for electric tools all over the place as well as skylights and plenty of lighting in there as well as a couple of large shop vacuums. From the workshops we moved on to the garage where both of Wayne and Ian’s cars were, and room for two or three more.
From the garage we went to the barn and there I could still smell the odor of horse and I told Josh I couldn’t wait to be able to ride again. He admitted he had never had lessons, or a chance to ride before his stroke. I told him I knew of a couple of people who only had one arm and they could ride, I even told him about a couple of one-legged guys who rode with their prosthetic on. He asked if I thought he could really do that too and I pulled his face down to mine and I told him I had faith in him, and I wanted him along for all my adventures for a long, long time. I must have done, or said, the right thing because I got kissed! Not a sloppy mushy one, a sweet endearing meshing of our lips, no tongue, his good left arm around my neck and my arms clutching his back as he knelt between my legs as I sat in the wheelchair.
After what seemed like a lifetime, but was probably only two or three minutes, we broke apart, I think we were both breathless at that point, too scared or pleased to even have been breathing. At exactly the same time we both said, “Thank You” to each other, grinning like fools, like we had both just won a million dollars. The rest of our tour was kind of anti-climactic after that, but boy did we have fun exploring while the adults went over the first draft for the riding trails, and Ian and Wayne were presenting Ron with my idea about “rest stations” on the longer trails. I told Josh about that idea and he thought it was a great idea, people wouldn’t be pissing and shitting out in the woods and youngsters wouldn’t be having “accidents”, and there could even be changing stations for parents to use for toddlers. We high fived on that one.
I used my cell to phone Wayne and added Josh’s suggestion about changing stations in the out houses and he agreed with us about that idea as Josh and I continued exploring along the farm road between the fields, as there was no way I could take the wheelchair into the woods or the orchard even, it was just too rough in there for the chair. It was a great time for Josh and me to talk, and talk we did, not like the other day, in full paragraphs of questions, but really getting to know about each other. I told Josh about my being raised by strangers, not my father, and how we found out as we were moving, that my father had paid my mother to leave us, he had given her a hundred thousand dollars to give him a divorce and leave me with him, even if he didn’t raise me himself. I told him how Wayne and I became more like brothers as I grew older, and how Ian filled in all the gaps for me as I grew, and that now these two guys had found each other, and we really felt like a family.
Josh told me about how his stroke a few years ago changed him, about how it changed his friends and they now barely acknowledged him, even in school where he excelled in his studies. His mother was not in the picture, it was only his father and him for as long as he could remember, and he thought his father was the best father and he offered to share him with me when I needed a father, and not my uncles, as great as they were. It was then that I told him about them getting married at the end of the year and that then they would adopt me, and I’d have two fathers. He thought that was the coolest thing ever.
We did return to the house, as we both agreed it was a snack time, but I looked at my cell and saw it was closer to one pm now and what we really needed was lunch, after all, we were growing boys. Thankfully the three men in the house were ready for lunch too and we had a great time talking about the property and what Ron was going to be able to accomplish with the making of the trails.
There was a lot of excitement around our lunch table and when Ron and Josh left I admit I felt a little down, but I used my Ipad and continued the research I had been doing last night, making copious notes and I ended up using my desktop in my room to do further research, writing out my final findings to present on Tuesday. There was one more piece to my puzzle, and since my father had used this method, I decided that it might just be in my best interest to be as knowledgeable as possible, so I decided to ask Uncle Ian a question, so I left my room to do so.
I found the guys in the family room, watching a movie and when I rolled in, they both greeted me warmly and during a commercial break I asked if I could borrow Ian for five minutes. Wayne said he needed a bathroom break anyway, so why didn’t I take Ian for ten minutes. Ian and I went into the office just off the entry hall and I told him as he sat that he might need his computer for this, and that it wasn’t anything serious or anything, just something that had been running through my mind all day, but I had been afraid to bring up the subject. But now I had a reason to ask, and although I couldn’t reveal it now, it was a really good reason which I was going to be able to reveal soon, maybe by the end of the coming week, if not before. I needed to know just how much money was in my personal account. Not just the stocks and bonds, not the trust funds, but actual ready cash.
Ian knew I didn’t need a new skateboard or anything like that, he knew me as a serious kid and he just turned to his computer and in a few strokes, he showed me the current balance in my on demand savings account, One hundred thousand dollars, and a similar amount in a checking account I didn’t know I even had. On the same page was a net worth figure that blew me away, it was for several million in stocks, bonds, and the value of my trusts, but it was a small line at the bottom of the page that caught my attention, a line labeled “Line of Credit” which had an amount of seven million on it. I doubted that I’d need that much, but I just might need more than the two hundred thousand in the checking and savings accounts. I turned the screen back to Ian and he closed it out, asking if I had the answer to my question. I told him I did, and thanked him for his help once again. He told me it was his pleasure as usual.
When we regrouped in the family room Wayne had a huge bowl of popcorn on the coffee table and he brought me up to speed on the movie they had been watching and we spent an enjoyable time watching the rest of “Strictly Ballroom” together before we all decided on “Love Actually” for the last one before my bedtime. By sticking to my school time schedule, it made it easier on my biological clock and also it didn’t interrupt Wayne and Ian’s routine either, considering they had the bathing and changing duties to perform for me for now and I really appreciated their help, without it I would have had to rely on a hired home health care stranger to help out. Since my research for Tuesday was as complete as I could hope for, I spent time on my Ipad again once the guys had gone off to their own bedroom. This time I looked up caterers who provided on site weddings and found two in our town, which sort of surprised me since both companies featured wedding pictures of same sex couples on their web sites. I was surprised and pleased and made a note in my book of their names and contact numbers, wondering how soon I would have to book one of them for New Year’s Eve. I closed the notebook and put it on my nightstand, and plugged the Ipad and my cell phone into their chargers before falling asleep.
So Saturday had turned out to be a big day for me, I had come up with a good idea for rest areas on the longest of our proposed riding trails, and I had a definite figure I had available to spend, I got to see more of the property we had bought and moved to, and most important of all, I had given and received my first real kiss from a boy I was just about over the moon about. Sunday afternoon Josh came over to deliver his dad’s drawings of the oversized “out houses” he had done up for approval before he went to the lumber yard on Monday. He wanted this done so he not only knew in the next few days how much room to clear in the wooded trails for these, but he had found out about a big sale at the local lumber yard on Monday, but only for the first fifty customers, so his dad was planning to go there really early to get in line, but he needed to know if the rest rooms were going to be included so he could get a really good deal on the raw lumber he would need when it came time to assemble them.
It didn’t hurt that while Wayne and Ian were looking over the six or seven different plans Ron had drawn up that Josh and I were alone in the family room sharing that day’s kiss, and when done with that we joined the guys in the kitchen to get a look at the plans ourselves. Josh mentioned that there should be a window or a skylight in each unit built or we would have to have electric out there for lights because no one wanted to be in such a small dark place going to the bathroom. Ian and Wayne heaped praise on Josh for thinking of that and they took the one plan we all agreed on and Ian noted Josh’s suggestion on that one and told Ron in the note that whichever he wanted, window or skylight, was alright with us, but one or the other would be needed. Josh took the approved plan back to his father and was off with a wave of his good hand.
After our dinner that evening, as we cleared the table and I wheeled the stacked plates and cutlery to the sink, Ian stopped me on my return and pointed into the family room, to the rather large mirror on the wall facing us here in the kitchen. He didn’t say a word, just returned to wiping down the table as the implication of what he had shown me sunk in. I then realized they had seen Josh and I kissing that afternoon while they were looking over the outhouse designs. When I next caught Ian’s eye he just winked at me.
We had a sort of meeting after dinner, the topics ranging from the outhouses to how many horses we should start off with, not fully expecting everyone to have to rent a horse to ride the trails, as there were plenty of locals who had their own, but not as extensive trails as we would end up with, and not with the views either. As we looked at the trails Ron was proposing I compared them with the plot plan of the acreage and realized there was a pond on the property, quite a ways away from the house, nearer the farthest field from the house and was fed from a stream that ran under the farm road at the very end of the property. Wayne explained to me that many old farms and homesteads had a fire pond on them for the use of the local fire brigade in the case of a big fire. There were no fire hydrants out in the country and many houses used well water instead of piped in town water. The pond would have to be off limits for the general public, otherwise our insurance premiums would be off the charts. Maybe one day when we had a lifeguard on duty, but there were plenty of swimming lakes in the area, and a popular boating, picnic, and swimming one right here in town, Forge Pond.
Ron had mentioned this, so our trails would not be near the pond, in fact, just to be safe, a fence was going to be erected all around the pond to keep visitors away from it entirely. There would be places where local wildlife would still have access to the pond but hopefully no child, or rowdy teens, could get in there.
Monday morning, around 10, Josh showed up, saying his dad had been successful at the lumber yard and he was able to get them to deliver the purchases to the workshops after 1 in the afternoon. His dad was resting now, as he had been up at three in the morning to be one of the first 50 people at the lumber yard. Ron would be here at one to accept the delivery and see it was all stowed properly in the workrooms. Wayne suggested he get some shopping done in that case, so he asked for food suggestions to add to his grocery list and he took off for a large grocery store he had found in Fairview. Ian said he had accounts to work on and Josh and I decided to go for another “walk” around the property.
Josh and I had another day of getting to know each other and I found out during our excursion that there were parts of his right arm he could feel and times his arm muscles twitched and his fingers would spasm, but he had no control of his arm at all so he kept it tethered to him so it wouldn’t flop around as he moved and get even more damaged. Other things I learned were that his dad didn’t date, and he had only a few friends, some guys he sometimes worked with, either when he needed help on a job or when they did. He told me his dad had worked for a big contractor in the area, but after his stroke after a soccer game he was playing at school, his dad had become his caregiver at home and had to quit his job and take on handyman jobs to support them. I timidly asked if they had ever seen any specialists after his stroke, about his arm, and Josh told me that after his dad had to quit his job, they didn’t have any insurance, and besides, they were still paying off the medical bills from the stroke.
We stopped after a while and ate the sandwiches and chips we had brought with us, sipping from the water bottles we had placed in another bag and hung from the back of my chair. We had stopped by the side of a field stone fence, so we would be at the same height when Josh sat on the low fence, Josh delighted in telling me that this once must have been a pig field the fence was so low. We heard across the field the noise of a big truck, so we finished up and went to watch the unloading of the purchases from the lumberyard. We settled in out of the way, but where we could see the lumber, small windows, and even two skylights being stored in the farthest workroom. There were even several bags of cement for pads to build the priveys on and the composting toilets themselves, ten of them, two for each outhouse. They would have a dividing stall around them so double occupancy could be achieved when needed. Josh told me his dad had designed a shelf with a rail around it that could be used as a changing table for infants and toddlers that would be on the wall opposite the loos and a tiny sink in each building for washing up, a small solar water heater for each unit was ordered already.
Wayne returned with groceries and we saw him talking to Ron and as it turned out, Wayne had invited them to have dinner with us, it was going to be a burger night, so a cookout would be involved. Josh and his dad left for their home at about eight and I was settled in my bed by nine thirty, remembering to ask Ian to please wake me when he got up, as we had my all-important check up in the morning. I spent the rest of my awake hour looking through my notes, and dreamt that night of a young soccer player raising his arms in victory after making a goal.
Our visit at Dr. Chris’s office started with a visit to Harry, the radiologist on the second floor. He apologized several times for the discomfort I was going through as he manipulated me on his table to try to match the x-rays taken at the hospital which I had no memory of, and he explained that my being out of it had allowed them to manipulate me into some strange positions which he had to imitate. About 20 minutes after we had been escorted to the waiting room, we were invited to meet with Dr. Chris in his office. He explained that everything was healing very well internally but he still had to inspect his surgical incisions, so we moved to an examining room where between the doctor and Ian I was able to get on the exam table pantsless and without the compression shorts on. His exam was brief, and I did feel a poke here and there, but he said all was well, in fact very well and if I got dressed again, with Ian’s help, he’d see us once again in his office.
Once everything was back on, I made sure my notebook was in the side pouch of the wheelchair and we made our way to the office again. Dr. Chris told us that one more week with the compression shorts both on, and then two weeks with only the top pair on, used as underwear. I could have therapy if my gait was bad, but he thought just trying to walk a bit each day for a week, trying for a bit more distance each day and no running, and I should be just fine. What a relief!
At this point I asked Ian if he’d mind waiting out in the waiting room for me as I had a few personal questions to ask the doctor. He winked at me and left us and of course my first question was when I could masturbate again and could I stop the pills as I really had no real pain and I thought just an aspirin if needed would do the trick. He agreed, telling me it was on my new instruction sheet he’d give me on the way out, and then I asked him if he had ever treated a juvenile stroke victim, say a ten-year-old who was now 12 and with a useless right arm.
Dr. Chris sat back in his desk chair and asked if I had a specific patient in mind and I told him I did, someone without insurance, but with a private benefactor. I opened my notebook and removed some printouts from my computer and began to give the doctor a rundown of Josh’s current condition and the twitches and tingles he sometimes experienced, which I thought indicated he had some remaining nerve activity, maybe the controlling nerve bundle should be looked at. The arm hadn’t atrophied in the two years since the stroke so maybe the twitches meant the muscle groups were just missing the proper stimulus. I then handed him the printouts that I had used to base my assumptions on.
First though, Dr. Chris made a call to his receptionist and told her we would be another 10 to 20 minutes in here and then he looked at the printouts and then asked when he could see my patient, and I laughed and told him it was a boy I really cared for and he asked if he was my boyfriend, showing me a picture of him with another man in suits in a beautiful gazebo, and another on his desk that had over a dozen young men and boys with the same two guys in the middle, he told me that was his husband Noah and their children, all adopted. He went on to tell me he had a doctor in mind he wanted to consult, about my friend, and if she was available soon, would it be possible for them to see my friend here? He told me that she had done wonders for one of his patients and that he specialized in bones, her specialty was nerves and muscle stimulus. I sheepishly asked how expensive this could all end up costing and I was so relieved when he said about thirty or forty thousand, he was afraid, but if it was possible, they might even be able to do day surgery here and that would save the benefactor a bundle.
I took out my debit card and asked him to please make out a receipt for thirty thousand and put it on that card, if he’d trust me for the balance if there was any. He looked so kind and almost teary when he told me that he already trusted me and that he knew that I could afford it, but he’d hold off on charging me anything until we knew more about what kind of expenses we were going to be running up. He looked in his computer for a number and made a call to the other doctor, I think he had called her a neurologist or something like that, it sounded familiar from my research anyway. He spoke with her quietly for a few minutes and then asked me if this coming Saturday, at noon, could I have my friend and one of his parents here and I told him that was doable, I thought.
As he wrote me an appointment reminder and a couple of phone numbers, I asked if that gazebo was anywhere nearby and could it be rented for my uncles’ wedding.
By the time I rolled back out to reception Ian had already paid for today’s visit and I waved to the doctor as he stood there, watching us leave, with a smile on his face. He had asked me if I had any desire to study medicine for a career, and I said I hadn’t really thought about it, but thanks for the suggestion, and I looked forward to Saturday. Out in the car once again Ian asked me when Josh’s appointment was, and I just about swallowed my tongue he had surprised me so much. I asked what made him think I had set up an appointment for Josh and Ian told me he had heard the receptionist at the desk being told to block off noon ’til 2PM on Saturday for a consultation with Dr. Ingram and young Dr. Wheeler, I had been stuffing my notebook into my pouch on the right side of my chair and zipping it shut and not paying attention to the doctor and his schedule keeper behind me at the time. Ian also put that together with my asking how much disposable income I had available and after doing some arithmetic came up with my helping Josh get the use of his arm back.
I explained the gist of my research and suppositions and they happened to coincide with Dr. Chris’ and he had called in a favor with another doctor and she happened to be available for lunchtime on Saturday, and the current estimate was way lower than I had originally thought, and that it might even be lower still if the procedure could be done in the on-site surgery at the other end of the hall we were at having the x-rays done today. Ian told me he thought I was being a wonderful boyfriend to Josh, and I told him I was going to do it because it was the right thing to do, even before I knew Josh liked me as much as I liked him. I then said that we had to have Ron on board with all this because he had to accompany us to the doctors on Saturday at noon. Ian replied that he’d have to check the employment contract Ron had signed and make sure he would now have adequate, or better, insurance for the two of them.
It was then I changed the subject and asked why he and Wayne were waiting for New Year’s Eve to get married, wouldn’t it make better sense to marry while the weather was good, rather than possibly having to get married during a snowstorm? He glanced at me as he drove and then asked me what I had done, but with a big grin on his face. I told him we had to get Wayne and go for a drive in a little while, so I’d reveal all then, if he didn’t mind.
When we got home Ian left me in the car and went in to get Wayne and we three left and we went back toward Dr. Chris’s office and I told Ian to take the left turn before the street the offices were on and he did and there was a huge home there and I told Ian to drive past the barn and stop at the gazebo on his side of the road we were on. There was Dr. Chris’ husband standing in the gazebo. He came to the car and invited us to look over the inside and the views from there, but I told the guys to go look and I’d wait there in the car, since the wheelchair was too bulky and heavy for such a quick stop. The three men introduced themselves and I could see Noah pointing at the mountains in the distance and I realized that Dr. Chris had said I could start to walk again, just to take it easy, so I flexed my legs and they felt right so I opened the door and swung around in my seat, put my feet on the ground and holding on to the door, I raised myself up on my own two feet for the first time in just about two months. I felt pretty good about that.
As I made my way around the hood of the car, holding on to the fender as I did, Wayne came running to me, asking just what I thought I was doing, but Ian spoke up and said that I was cleared for a little moving around on my own as long as I took it easy. With one of them on each side, I made it to the gazebo and took my first three stairs in a while to join Noah up there. He shook my hand and asked if I was Dr. Wheeler and I chuckled and told him I was just Max, and thanked him for meeting us here.
I looked out over the view and Noah was telling us that at sunset the whole mountain range off in the far distance lit up in colors that defied nature in their intensity. Reds, oranges, blues, and shafts of sunlight streaming through all that as the sun set behind the mountains. It sure looked good to me and I could tell Ian and Wayne were very interested. Wayne asked what they rented the venue for and Noah chuckled and said they never rented it, but the gazebo had been the site for over fifty weddings, most of them family oriented and the chapel down the lane had seen over twenty weddings and two dozen or more baptisms since they had moved it onto their property. He then went on to tell us a brief history of the property and we three were suitably impressed with what they had accomplished here.
Noah, in turn, was interested to learn what we intended for our own property and we told him about hiring Ron and about our plans for a variety of riding trails, some long enough that we had plans for rest areas complete with restrooms and picnic areas. Noah liked all our ideas and the fact we were making use of Ron’s skills. It seems that Ron used to work for Noah’s brother in law and he knew how everyone felt after Josh’s stroke when Ron quit his job to take care of his son. Ian gently nudged me and told me he was going to walk me back to the car, he thought I had spent enough time on my feet for the first time since the day of the car accident, so I shook Noah’s hand and told him I’d get these two guys to set a firm date, and if the offer was still open, I thought that this place was special and I could see my favorite guys exchanging their vows here. He assured me that something could be worked out, he was sure of it.
Ian walked with me back to the car and saw me safely back to the front passenger seat before going back to Wayne and Noah. The next thing I knew we were stopped in front of our house and Wayne had opened my door and was waiting with my wheelchair, and gently rubbing my shoulder to wake me. He asked if I felt I needed help getting into the chair and I told him I hadn’t thought that walking the little I had would have tired me out so much I would need a nap. He told me that it wasn’t just the short walk, it was also standing upright for fifteen minutes, not bad for my debut on two legs. I swung both legs out and with his help got upright and then into the motorized chair. We went up the ramp and into the house as Ian parked the car in the garage.
By the time we had cleaned up after lunch we could hear the huge industrial mower starting up and Wayne thought that Ron must be back from his own lunch break and he thought that he and Ian should go talk to him about the consultation I had instigated for Josh this coming Saturday and I really wanted to be there to present my findings to Ron so he wouldn’t think badly of me for going behind his back to set this up. Ian spoke up and said he thought we should invite both Ron and Josh for dinner tonight and bring up the subject over a family type meal, and we could then also let them know that the new insurance package that went with Ron’s employment would cover any and all expenses for the two of them, as well as the three of us. So, Wayne went out to find Ron and extend the invitation as Ian went into the office to print out the new insurance policy to present to Ron this evening, and I called Josh to ask if he could come over.
Once Wayne was back, having gotten Ron to agree to dinner tonight, he helped me to my room where he helped me out of the lower layer of the compression shorts and helped me back into the outer pair which I would use by themselves for the next two weeks. Once redressed we returned to the first floor in time for Josh’s arrival. I wanted to be standing when he came in and Wayne said that should be alright, but only for five minutes, I still needed to do things in short intervals, so I didn’t overtire myself, just as it would be when we started on the therapy tomorrow.
So, I was able to stand and greet Josh when he came in the house, and I could see the conflicting emotions cross his face, happiness for me, his fear that now that I was on my way to being ambulatory, I might just drop him. So, as I slowly walked up to him I threw my arms around him and pulled him to me so I could hug him, our first time hugging, standing as equals.
As I felt his left arm around me, I reached down to his right hand and tickled his palm and he giggled, telling me he felt that a little. I sat in my chair and Josh took the end chair at the kitchen table and I told him that during my doctor’s visit today I had told him about the stroke he had had and that my doctor and another one would like to meet him and maybe re-evaluate his arm. I told him that if I would be able to walk again, I wanted to be able to hold his hand as we roamed the property either on foot or on horseback, I loved the feel of his hug with only one arm, but I wanted him to have the use of both of them, not only for hugging, but to play ball with and to enhance his soccer games with too. Besides, who was going to help me with my garden? I told him about the new insurance coverage Ian had secured for all of us, he and his father included.
He asked if the examination would hurt, and I told him that if it did, then there was more evidence his arm could be fixed, or at least improved. I told him I had to start undergoing therapy and I didn’t want to do it alone, I wanted him there with me. Wayne came and sat with us after putting a plate of cookies down and two glasses of milk for us. He told Josh there were no guarantees that either of these doctors could totally restore the full use of his arm, but even if there was a bit of improvement, whatever the cost would be worth it, and any cost would be covered totally. Josh was just about sobbing at that point, but Wayne went on, telling Josh that his father would have to agree to all this, and also accompany him to Dr. Chris’s office at noon on Saturday. That got Josh weepy again, but he said his Dad would be so happy. He had just about paid off the original hospital bills and was himself looking on the internet about further treatment for him.
We explained that the two of them were coming for dinner tonight and then Ian and Wayne would break the news to Ron and arrangements would be made for Saturday. Josh said he would keep quiet about it until then and he and I went up to my room where I went over my nerve research with him. After we had gone over the websites I had found the information on with him, Josh shyly asked why I had done so much research for him, and I told him the truth, I liked him, and I thought that every time one of us got a break, we should try to make the other one of us feel special too, I mean, isn’t that what couples do for each other? His grin answered for him and we ended up kissing for a long, long time.
We decided to get out of the house for a while, so we went back downstairs and told Wayne we were going to check the mail and grab the newspaper while we were out, as I couldn’t remember us doing that after we came back from the doctor’s appointment. We went out the entrance to the driveway and retrieved the mail and the paper and brought them back to the house, and after dropping them off we went to see if we could tell how far on the first trail Ron had gotten. We made it to the head of the trail Ron was cutting and we could see it was a bit rough for him this close to the home property. He had first cleared out all the dead growth for about fifty yards into the wooded land the trail would start off in, this included several dead trees that for some reason no one else had taken care of during the last several years. Ian came up to us and said that it really looked like Ron was going to need some helpers sooner than we had thought, but he was very impressed with the work done so far, that was going to be something to talk about also after dinner, we couldn’t have Ron working like that all the time, we’d wear him out well before his time, and we really were counting on him being around for a long, long time, I squeezed Josh’s left hand when we heard that, and he applied pressure to mine in return.
He knew I meant he was included in that statement, and he was acknowledging that and replying he was pleased he was going to be around me for some time to come. Ian surprised me when he asked if I wanted to see closer to where Ron was working and I started to get up out of my chair when he chuckled and told me “not so fast sport, you aren’t ready for that yet!”, so he went to the barn and came out with a large wagon with wheels on it like those fat wheeled bikes, but much smaller, more the size of the original wagon wheels but much fatter. The wagon had a foam rubber liner and a terrycloth cover over that. He helped me get settled in and he began to pull the wagon over the ground toward where Ron was now using a chainsaw to cut up some dead tree trunks.
The going was a tad rough, but way smoother than if the wagon had its original skinny tires on it. I laughed, telling Ian and Josh that I felt like a kid being pulled along. We got to see how Ron had gotten on and it really did seem that there was a very passable trail evolving from his handiwork. He took a breather when he saw us approaching and told us it was too bad we had gas fireplaces in the house, as he thought we’d have several cords of aged firewood before too long, it was a shame the previous owners didn’t maintain the groves of trees on the property. Ian agreed and told Ron that the resulting firewood, once sold off, would probably make up for the cost of hiring at least three guys to help Ron carve out the trails, did Ron have anyone in mind that could start this week?
For some reason Ron’s eyes lit up and he said he knew of one definitely, and another two possibly, but he would give them all a call later, and Ian reminded him we were all having dinner together tonight, so if he wanted help tomorrow out here, maybe he should call all three now so they could make plans to start with Ron in the morning. Ron pulled out his cell and began his calls as we made our way back to where we had left my wheelchair in front of the barn.
Dinner that evening was again lasagna with green beans on the side and tons of garlic bread. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood and Ron listened attentively when Ian and I told him about my doctor’s new appraisal of my condition and the therapy I would need to regain some strength in my legs and to regain my balance. Ian nodded to me and I told Ron, as Wayne and Ian cleared the dinner plates off the table, that I had probably overstepped my bounds a bit, but I had done some research about nerve and muscle damage in stroke victims and presented it to my doctor. I told him Dr. Chris was very interested in both the research I had done, and also in the fact that Josh was having tremors and slight muscle spasms in his right arm and had called a doctor who specialized in Josh’s type of limb use loss and we had set up an appointment for a consultation for this coming Saturday at noon.
Before he could say anything, Ian spoke up and said that as of today his insurance with our policy covered preexisting conditions and would be more than adequate to cover any expense in getting Josh’s arm functioning again, any expense. Josh went to his dad and asked if they could go with us to Dr. Chris’s office on Saturday and Ron just broke down crying. He kept apologizing for breaking down, but we all asked if that meant “Yes”, the consultation was on for Saturday, and he just nodded, too choked up to speak. Ian told Wayne to serve the good desert, not the store-bought cookies he couldn’t stand, we were celebrating tonight.
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