by Elizabeth Peavey

A mile in her shoes

I never get sick.

Are there more fateful words that can be uttered? Why not just put a giant bull’s eye on your back and wait for the phlegm to fly? Except, the truth is, I don’t ever get sick. Aside from the errant sniffle and complaint, I am usually blessed with good health.

Then I opened by big mouth at the end of the year.

It seemed everyone I knew had some sort of malady. I put up my best defense: OCD-style hand washing; holding my breath when I walked by someone (even outdoors) who looked infirm; radically sanitizing equipment at the gym before using it, even if the person before me had just performed said task. I proclaimed with full braggadocio that I was Teflon to the world’s germs and cooties.

That’s when the arrow found its mark and took me down. Engagements were broken. “Can’t meet for coffee,” I texted my friend Bonnie (replete with a puffy- faced selfie). “I tick.” I actually napped, despite the fact I could feel the beady eyes of my Yankee forbearers bearing down on me. And I whined. “Waaa,” I said, “I can’t go on my daily walk.” “Waaa, beer doesn’t taste good.” “Waaa, whining hurts my throat.”

Right around this time, I received a Facebook post from my friend Michie. She had been doing some year-end accounting and calculated she’d made 13 trips to Mass General in the past year, including two major surgeries. I blew my nose, took a slug of my toddy and gave pause.

Readers of The Bollard might recall the profile of Michie I wrote a year ago. She has a genetic condition called neurofibromatosis (NF, for short). Hers is a rare strain, known as NF2, that causes benign tumors to grow in her brain and around her spinal cord. She was diagnosed in 1982, when she was 26. In 1983, the removal of a tumor from her acoustic nerve caused her to become deaf in one ear. Her vestibular function was compromised, degrading her balance. She lost the rest of her hearing at age 39. She does not read lips, and for those of us who don’t sign, she keeps notebooks and her iPad handy to give her speakers “voice.” Due to complications from one of several major surgeries, she is partially paralyzed. At first, she could guide herself around rooms by grabbing onto things, and she navigated open spaces with trekking poles, the kind serious hikers use. Now she is entirely dependent on a walker. But she has another conveyance to get around town, and this was the subject of my cover story: her recumbent trike.

Cycling was not much in the cards for her this past year. In October of 2013, tumors were discovered on her spine. If she didn’t have them removed, it wouldn’t be long before she would be in a wheelchair. Opting out of surgery wasn’t even a consideration for Michie. A date was set for the following March. She sold her not-wholly-accessible (but gorgeously decorated) condo on the West End and purchased an open-concept unit on the East End that’s more adaptable to her needs. She moved in and arranged her antiques in this modern setting as though they had been selected specifically for the space. Then there was just the matter of having her back opened up.

The surgery was deemed successful, but it would take time to see how it affected her mobility. In May, I accompanied Michie on one of her post-op visits. Because of her deafness and the difficulty she experiences getting around, she needs someone to travel with her to Boston. Usually that’s her friend Hank, but, as I said, there were 13 of these trips, and, well, my schedule is nothing if not flexible. Besides, we were going to have fun.

Yes, that’s right. One of the things Michie insists on when she makes this trip is pampering herself — and her companion. We took a leisurely train ride down (her treat), hopped in a taxi and went to The Liberty, a boutique hotel next to Mass General that Michie uses as home base. She is quite the celebrity there. As soon as the cab pulled up a doorman hauled her walker from the trunk and brought it around like a carriage, calling out, “Miss O’Day! Miss O’Day!” Porters and bellmen gave her the same enthusiastic greeting, as did the desk staff upstairs. (A discerning eye would note the neatly folded bill palmed to several of these employees as she passed — a smooth operator, this one.)

We went directly to the hotel’s formal dining room, Scampo, for a smart lunch: salad Niçoise for her, spring-vegetable ravioli for me. (Again, she insisted on paying.) After I left her at her appointment, I stomped around Beacon Hill until my feet ached, then returned to collect her. We took a cab to the train station, hit the bar car as soon as it opened, and were back in Portland in time for dinner. Substitute her medical appointment with a trip to the MFA and it would’ve been a perfect girls’ getaway.

Fast forward to this past fall. The March surgery had not yielded the improvements Michie had hoped it would. Plus, more tumors had grown on her spine. Another major surgery was not appealing, but she was resolved not to lose more ground. She asked if I could accompany her on another trip. Well, duh.

So, on November 20, she and I boarded a Trailways bus for an overnight at The Liberty. Same reception when we arrived, except this one was accompanied by glasses of bubbly, which we enjoyed in the lobby. I would be in charge of keeping her posse apprised of her progress via her Facebook page and an e-mail list, which we set up as we sat and sipped. My other major duties would include waking her up at 4 a.m. (“No bullshit from me,” she said, demonstrating the ASL sign: right forearm over left, fingers wagging on each end); getting her to pre-op on time; and transferring her belongings — in particular, her walker and orthotics (plastic braces that extend from beneath her feet to below her knees; she can’t walk without them) — to her hospital room after the surgery. This meant I would spend the bulk of the day tramping around Boston pushing a walker with an overstuffed white plastic hospital bag perched atop it. I felt like a faker at first. Then I discovered how few people would hold an elevator, or scoot out of my way, or offer to open a door, so — OK, I admit it — I milked it a little bit. Just a small limp. Just to test humanity.

The evening before surgery, Michie and I had a sumptuous meal at Scampo, where she received the same royal treatment. Barstools were pulled out. Her walker whisked away. Handshakes and kisses given across the bar. I furiously typed all the hellos and well-wishes showered upon her. When someone wanted to know where Hank was, I typed, “What am I? Chopped liver?” She and I sipped our wine, gossiped and cackled. Not a care in the world, right?

The next morning I bolted awake before the alarm sounded on my phone and the two wake-up calls arrived. I went over to Michie’s bed and shook her shoulder. “Five minutes!” she barked, and rolled away from me. I gently shook her again. She turned her head. I was standing there, waggling my fingers, trying to do the bullshit gesture, but I probably looked so ridiculous that she decided it was easier to get up than watch me mangle her language.

The soaring glass and endless corridors of Mass General had an other-worldliness as we made our way to surgery in the predawn. We thought we had a great jump on the day, but there was already a line. A line! Yet once the doors opened, all the patients and their companions were sucked in and digested by this fine-tuned machine.

I can’t begin to count the number of pre-op nurses that filtered through Michie’s bay. Each of them had questions to ask, information they needed to ascertain. It was my job to write as fast as I could: Any metal implants? When did you last pee? You need to roll on your side. The pages of my legal pad flew. Michie’s responses were often cheeky. She had everyone — forgive me — in stitches. Nurses took vitals, clucked and fussed. One applied glue to Michie’s scalp and placed electrodes there while she chatted about Boston restaurants. This could have been a trip to the hairdresser for highlights, but for the nurse jabbing at Michie’s arm, looking for a vein for the I.V. “I’m an ideal patient,” she told the flummoxed woman. “It’s just my veins that are a bother.”

Then it was go-time. “See ya!” Michie said brightly as she was wheeled away. The surgeon would call several hours later. The news would be good, the operation a success. But I didn’t know that yet. I only knew I had just witnessed an extraordinary act of grace and courage. I loaded up the walker and rolled off.

One of Michie’s recent Facebook posts closed with this: “2015 WILL be my year for good health, more time for friends and a lot more cycling!”

Cheers to that, my friend. Cheers to that.

Elizabeth Peavey encourages you to check out the paintings of Michie O’Day at michieoday.com.