I had not either until my mom was injured recently….and I want to give you a few examples of the comparisons I have found along the way. I will let you be the judge and see if you can relate 🙂

Power Steering – what is that …. You know an old truck is really hard to steer….have you ever tried to steer a wheel chair.  It takes a city block to turn one around, if there is something anywhere near it – I will run over it and it goes when you don’t want to go and stops when you don’t want to stop.  I have seen some old trucks just like this with a mind of their own it seemed. I have tried to turn them and its like i was standing up and sitting on the steering wheel trying to make it happen. This was long before power steering and heavens I am glad that power steering was invented, that for sure.

Rough riding as heck….those old trucks bump along the road and it doesn’t matter how slow you go – you are going to have a rough ride…. and it seems that is the same way it is in that wheel chair.  Your injury is probably tender and every bump or door facing is a huge challenge.  You try to go slow and you feel like a snail, if you go fast it hurts like h**l.  I am sure you get the picture.  The old trucks have those tires that find every bump and those wheel chairs have no springs and vice versa. We have bounced and bumped many times down the roads of rural east Texas in an old truck. After my mom’s last doctors appointment with me and my sister, my mom probably feels the same way LOL.

Manual transmission…. Most of the old trucks had manual transmission.  So does some of the wheel chairs you use.  The wheel chair my mom is using is “man-powered” you can just ask her and her shoulder. Yes there are the power chairs, but I promise you – you best be a very talented person to drive one.  If you aren’t, you could possibly make a new door where there wasn’t one and you may run in to everything in your path if you are like us.  I kind of compare wheelchairs to a “newbie” and a manual transmission.  If you do not know what you are doing it (like the wheelchair) can be a little treacherous.  You can see folks “Bumping and Jumping” and trying to get all the maneuvering in place when learning to drive a manual transmission. We have been the same way with that wheel chair. (You get what I mean)

Where do you put that thing ?….   Its big, its awkward and no matter where you park the wheelchair in the house, you need it someplace else.  As you gather the wheelchair up for a trip, you fold it up and think …we are ready.  But wait, then comes the time to put it in the vehicle for this trip.  Just get ready, you will be pushing and shoving and trying to get it all to fit inside the vehicle.  As you are done you hope and pray that you can get it out when you reach your destination without drawing too big of an audience.  That’s kind of like the old truck….they always are in the parking spot of the garage that was supposed to be for the regular vehicle. They are always seem to be in someone’s way or someone’s parking spot no matter where you put them.  You get them someplace and you hope and pray they start even though you have worked and worked to get them prepared and ready for the trip.  And then, where do you park…. You want to be sure someone can see your “treasure” but then again you don’t want it scratched up…..The struggles are real and the similarities are definitely there at our house.

I know you are thinking that this is kind of goofy, and maybe a little bit silly, but if you have ever been in one or the other of these situations you will know that the struggle is real.  My mom’s wheel chair is only temporary and for that I am eternally thankful.  I hope and pray that these old trucks are forever in our future.  We have laughed and we have cried (just like me and mom and that wheelchair).  We have been on adventures and journeys that we will never forget (as mom and I have as well). 

It takes a village to get us together and and where we are going. This week when we were all crammed in my little car on the way to the doctor the other day, my mom, my sister and i laughed until we cried.  We were given a blessing at that doctors appointment and we were blessed by that.

Life is a journey; you should always try to look at it as an adventure that can be cherished.

If life gives you lemons … make lemonade. 

Whether it is a manual transmission or has no power steering drive it anyway!

God Bless Each of You.