Russel Goes Back to the Orthopedist and Gets a Wheelchair

Friday, June 28, 2019
Bombay

Russel Goes Back to the Orthopedist and Gets a Wheelchair

     Namaste from Bombay!
     Today was another exhausting day and at the end of it, I was ready to completely unwind.
      I awoke at about 5.30 am and began reading (making good progress with my novel The Cuckoo's Calling), then blogged and read a bit of the Times of London to find out what is happening in the world. Then, I spent a long time on the phone with my friend Ashley as the rain beat down steadily and deafeningly. The monsoon always stages a comeback year after year in a showy display of sound and fury and everything is perfectly fine as long as one is warm and dry indoors--as I plan to stay for most of it!
     At my laptop, I continued drafting my newsletter which is very long as it combines the goings-on of two months--as I did not send out a letter last month. When that was done, I attended to the collection of blurbs from writers around the world who have agreed to send them to me for the back jacket of my book. All of this took me until lunch time when I had one chapatti, two meatballs, some sambhar and some coconut chutney with fresh mango for dessert.
      I then left and walked to Dad's place in the rain. I need to take a slightly longer route there now as the lane in which my building is located is low-lying and tends to flood in heavy rain--which is definitely what we are now having.  We had to get Russel to Dr. Bhende's clinic at Dadar and the ambulance was expected to arrive at 2.00 pm for our 2.45/3.00 pm appointment. When I arrived at Dad's place. Dad and Russel's friend, Maurice, who is the sacristan of our church, was already there. I have solicited his help in getting to the clinic because once I return to the States, I want to be sure that there is someone else around to help Dad with these clinic visits. I wanted that someone to make a 'practice' run with me, while I am around, to get the hang of what the process is like.
     As it turned out, a new driver and helper were appointed to bring the ambulance in today and they could not find Dad's place easily. Hence, they were late and instead of arriving at 2.00, they came at 2.25. Fortunately, we were not held up too much on our way to the clinic and we did make it in time--we were there by 3.00 pm. Russel had arrived to get his staples from his surgical incision removed and that was done very quickly. Later, the doctor arrived to take a look at it. He told us that it looks good and that he would do one more dressing after which his leg would be encased in a plaster cast. Russel was taken to the room in which the plaster cast was applied and was sent home. We have been told to bring him back at the end of July or early in August so that the plaster cast can be removed, the incision can be inspected (hopefully, it will have healed) and a new fibre glass plaster cast applied.
      As Dad said, there seems to be no light at the end of the tunnel. It is a never-ending process of clinic visits and applications of treatments and all this because Russel is mentally handicapped, cannot take care of himself, does not know how to manipulate his own body which does not have the same capacity to heal itself that a normal human being's body can do. All this is very disheartening for Dad--although Russel's and my characteristic optimism is seeing us through these stages.
     Dad was most disappointed because he had told Russel that after this visit, he would be able to walk about the house with his walker. However, knowing about Russel's mental limitations, the doctor has said that he cannot put load on his leg and, therefore, should keep walking to the minimum to allow the bone to set. I told Dad that there was a very easy solution to that--all we had to do was bring a wheelchair so that we could wheel Russel from room to room in his flat. That way his quality of life would be enhanced as he would not be confined to his bed alone. Dad thought it was a very good idea and so I resolved to go over to St. Peter's Church to get his a wheelchair just as soon as we reached home. 
     After payment had been made at the clinic, we took Russel back in the ambulance and, with everyone dying for a cup of tea or coffee (Dad and Russel had coffee at home), I raced back home to get myself a cup of decaff tea (as there is none in Dad's house). But before I sat to enjoy my tea, I called the person at St. Peter's Church about the wheelchair. As it turns out, his name is also Russel D'Souza! He runs, on a voluntary basis, a lending institution that gives out medical equipment to members of the community, eg. walkers, commodes, wheelchairs, etc. When people finish using them, they return them to the place. It is a fantastic service and because we have availed of it for years (initially for my Mum and now for Russel), we do realize what a great service Russel performs for the community. Russel told me he would be available from 7.00 to 8.00 pm--so I sat down to relax with a pot of tea and a cookie and some mindless TV until I had to leave again to pick up the wheelchair.
     It was raining lightly as I walked through the lovely dripping lanes of Bandra to get to the church--but first, I stopped at Nature's Basket and picked up a few of the gourmet foods that I only get in this store: Danish blue cheese, Breton olive oil and basil flavored crackers and a fabulous loaf of whole wheat sourdough walnut raisin bread.
       Then I walked quickly to the church and found Russel at his post. By this time, to my ill-luck, it started pouring heavily, but I somehow managed to get to the place. Russel had a suitable wheelchair and we went through the formalities (I had to sign out for it and produce Dad's national ID card) and then the wheelchair was mine.
     But then came the fun of trying to find a rickshaw! It was simply bucketing down by then and Russel told me to try to find a rickshaw and bring it inside the church compound to his place. I went out on the road trying to find one when a rickshaw stopped right in front of me. A female passenger asked me if I had change for Rs. 500. I said I had none. She then tried to stop other passers-by but no one had change to give her! Finally, she told me to hop in with her, she would take the driver to a shop, get change, disengage the driver so that I could then hire his rick! And since I had no choice and there was no other rickshaw in sight, I did just that! She did find a shop that gave her change and she did disengage the driver at the same place to which I was headed--St. Peter's Church compound!
     And that was how I managed to get the wheelchair into the rickshaw. The nice rickshaw driver gave me a hand and in the driving rain, we got to Dad's place where Dad's building watchman then gave me a hand and helped me get it up Dad's few steps. I had kept the rickshaw waiting--so I simply told Dad I would return tomorrow to let him know how to open it up and close it again.
     I raced back into the rickshaw and was home in ten minutes, thanks to my super co-operative rickshaw driver. Back home,  I jumped in for a lovely hot shower to wash the dirt of the road off my feet and to wash off the stress and exhaustion of a very eventful day.
   I helped myself to the last of my pasta with the last of my Italian Bake and ate it with a mango as I watched The Wife--which later, Llew told me was one of the Oscar-nominated films of this year. It was very interesting as it dealt with the Nobel Prize for Literature and the writer who received it. But the nuances of his disturbed family life were examined in the film which, finally left me pretty dissatisfied as a lot of questions were left unanswered. Anyway, being that it was set in Stockholm in Sweden, took us into the workings of the Nobel Committee and the formalities associated with the event that takes place in a grand hall in Sweden (that Llew and I had visited on our Baltic Sea cruise stop in Stockholm), I found it very interesting.
     I went to bed at about 10.45 pm after a really significant and deeply productive family day.
     Until tomorrow...