Friday 7/27/07

Louis Soland and I didn't start out life with much in common. But since we were four years old, there has been a chilling likeness, almost as if we were twins.

His father was one of two or three physicians in Fort Lupton, where we both lived.

Louis and I were stricken with Infantile Paralysis during the epidemic in 1946. We each suffered paralyzing and withering effects in one leg and one arm. We both survived to go on living ''normal'' lives, if normal is a word that applies.

As the son of a butcher and a school teacher, people didn't make a connection between my ailment and my parents' occupations.

But as the son of a doctor, people were rather free with their comments about Louis. "A doctor's kid? Couldn't his dad do something?" There were other cruel statements of the same ilk.

The last time I saw Louis, in the fall of 1959, I was watching a football game which featured the Fort Lupton High School Blue Devils.

He was the quarterback. He limped every bit as badly as I. It looked painful to me, what he was trying to do -- run into and over a pile of sweaty flesh in order to "score."

Perhaps Dr. Soland encouraged his son to play, as did my Dad. Playing football would rend us "normal," right?

Our family had moved to Brighton in 1956, and I practiced with the Eighth Grade team that fall. (I practiced. I didn't play. There was too much at stake to let just any baboon on the field.)

I left the football program during my Ninth Grade season in Brighton. It wasn't really the emotional hardship of trying to keep up with stronger boys. It wasn't even the very real physical pain. What led me to "drop out?"

It was a stark reality. When the shiny new red Brighton Bullpups helmets arrived at the locker room, each ninth grader was fitted with one. Oh. Except me. I was issued the same helmet I'd had in Eighth Grade.

It was a simple stigma. I was the only ''team member'' who wasn't "normal," and I had the wrong helmet to prove it. Sitting on the bench, I could deal with. But sitting there in the conspicuous helmet, well it was too much.

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My yoke was light. All I had to do was have polio. The disease has unequivocally impacted me physically and emotionally, but I think in the long run it was more difficult for others than for me.

Who really got beat up by polio was my Dad. And my Mom. And my brother.

People undoubtedly said cruel things to my parents -- perhaps even unintentional, but cruel. Imagine, though, what the Soland family would have heard.

I think my Dad probably blamed himself all his life for my having had the disease. Somebody told him not to take us to California because "the boys will get polio.'' Something like that.

My parents worked hard for many years trying to help me "get over" polio. There are countless evidences of this drive of theirs -- the Cub Scout swimming program at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital being just one of the more remarkable.

Good old Dr. Fred Hartshorn, orthopedic surgeon, had recommended swimming as a "weightless" form of exercise to build my heart and lungs and some muscle.

Dad organized the program. Dad used his own school bus and his own gasoline to get us all there, weekly. It included 20 or 30 Cubbies, at different times, and it was of huge benefit to all of them. But it wasn't meant primarily for the other little guys.

It was for me.

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My brother Richard was deeply impacted by my childhood disease -- it continues to change his life to this day.

There were factors other than polio involved, I'm sure, but Dick's college studies were designed to prepare him for employment in Special Education.

He always had a drive to be of assistance to disabled persons. After college, he worked in "sheltered workshops," special ed positions, Boy Scouts, swimming programs and much much more.

Recently, he was named "Citizen of the Year" in Brighton, in recognition of his hard work to establish a Boys and Girls Club there. So he's still at it.

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On one memorable occasion in 1988, Dick interrupted our conversation here in the leather store in Greeley to go outside and greet a passerby.

When he came back in, Dick said, "That was Kent Martin. He was one of my clients in the sheltered workshop."

It had been ten years since Dick and Kent had seen each other. Dick asked me, "How was that for long-term follow-up?"

Although Kent has since moved to a different neighborhood, we still see him occasionally, and we do our best to extend Dick's long-term follow-up even longer.

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The duration of my initial stay in Children's Hospital might have been six months. When my parents brought me home that first time, I had been bedridden for so long that merely riding in a car was terrifying.

Tell you what, I was one sick little four-year-old boy, a limp and pale bag of bones. Dad carried me from the car to the couch in the living room.

Dick, age two, was there waiting for me to come home. As I lay there exhausted, Dick began running into our bedroom, picking up toys, and bringing them out to the couch. He brought out every toy he could carry and piled them all on top of me.

Soon, I was covered in toys. It vividly presaged Dick's personality. Like anyone else, he hasn't always known exactly how to help, but the desire to help has always been there.

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Many of you reading this have been "Landlords" at one time or other. As a landlord, you have Landlord Nightmares.

Here's one of ours:

Last winter, I dug into my Social Security check to pay the heating bill for my tenant Jack, who "wasn't working."

How soon they forget. This summer, Jack called me to bitch that his lawn hadn't been mowed. We agreed, it did need mowing. So we went out and mowed it.

So far this month, however, we haven't had to mow. I think Jack is afraid to call, since he still hasn't paid July rent.

We have literally hundreds of our own "Landlord Nightmares." But we want to read yours ! ! ! Submit them HERE! (Comments)

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Word of the week: Adolescent. Webster's New World says it derives from the Latin, to come to maturity, or interestingly, "to be kindled, to burn." Definition 1. Growing up; developing from childhood to maturity. And, 2. Youthful. (Were you hot when you were adolescent? Kindling? Burning up?)

Next week's word: Loquacious.