What Can You Do If You Have No Legs?

There was nothing different about Becky when I spoke to her on the phone. A bright, bubbly personality with a lovely, twisted sense of English humour. I was looking forward to meeting her already.

When she rocked up at the Backpackers Hostel I was operating at the time, she cruised through the door, sent her wheelchair into a tight spin to get through the office door and swung herself up onto the desk with her arms.

"'ello" she said in a broad, regional English accent. "Gotta room and a beer mate?"

Becky didn't have legs. I bring this up now because it really makes no difference to who she is and what she does, but it does make a difference in that she led, and probably still leads, a life few of us even dream of even as able bodied people.

Having reached the joyful age of two Becky darted behind an ice cream van and got run over. She was two, and she was very unlucky. Her injuries were so severe that within three years an infection had set in and she lost her other leg as well. More complications, the doctors spoke about multiple complications over the next few years, and by 16 years old Becky had been given six months to live.

And that should have been it. A short, eventful but very painful life, according to her doctors and specialists, was over.

But Becky didn't think so. She was in her mid twenties when she rocked up that day, and she didn't look anything like 'nearly dead' to me.

She gave me a verbal going over for having stairs, climbed them on her hands and asked me to 'throw her wheelchair up after her’.

Becky had more life, get up and go and spark about her than a lot of her fellow seasoned travellers knew what to do with. And due to what she'd been through, she was fearless.

She told me at her leaving party in England she'd been at the top of a very long flight of stairs, very drunk and wobbly on her hands.

She took one 'step' down and fell headlong, bouncing and rolling to the bottom. All her mates raced over to see if she was still alive and find what was broken. Someone immediately called an ambulance.

Becky was lying on her back looking up at the person who's front door she had crashed into.

"Hello" she said to him, rolling onto her stomach, "You're quite cute from down here."

"Are you alright?"

"Oh yes, that happens all the time. I'm dead lucky I don't have legs, I'd be breaking them every week. I don't know how you two legged people get around."

She got up onto her hands again and staggered (which is a site worth seeing) off down the road.

Becky stayed long enough to be given work around the place. She worked in reception booking people in and then showing them around, which for a surprising number of people was quite confronting. A lot of people don't know how to deal with people who are legless. She had to stop a few of them before they finished their first sentence.

"It's my legs, I haven't got any. It's not my ears, I can hear you, not my eyes, I’m not blind, and I'm not stupid so there's no need to talk to me like I am. I lost my legs, that’s all. You haven't seen them have you?"

She was constantly taking the Mickey out of me and I learned in the first five minutes to give it straight back. We had a running battle with the key rack, which she insisted should be on the floor where she could reach it, while I kept hooking it high up on a wall where she could only reach it by clambering onto the desk and stretching full length with her fingertips.

“You’re a sod you are,” she said, nearly falling off for the third time that morning.

‘Do you want a leg up?”

“Oh shut your face, I’ll kick your head in!”

In town we had an American warship arrive, close to Christmas, and about a thousand sailors were wandering around drinking from pub to pub, picking up girls, dropping them again and generally having a good time. Becky had gone out with some mates and they were all ogling this infusion of fresh male talent.

Also in town for a few days were a notorious, interstate motorcycle gang, in full leathers, colours, rugged and long bearded.

The leader was a monster of a man who dominated the street, and his attention had been drawn to a powerful looking sailor called Gator (because he wrestled alligators, or so he said), dressed in his whites. Gator had made a decision based on way too much beer and bravado, and chose to shoulder his way past the Leader in an act of military defiance.

Becky saw this potentially explosive encounter take place a few metres up the hill from where they were standing, and turned to watch. These two colossus of men rounded on and shirt fronted each other. The ground shook.

Gator bellowed at the leader, the Leader bellowed back at Gator. People scattered, US sailors and bikers materialised from everywhere and a small unit of armed policemen jumped into their squad cars and locked the doors.

There was a scream. "BECKY, what are you doing?"

Up the hill Becky had lined them up in her sites and took off on two well oiled wheels straight into the middle of the fray. Neither of them saw her coming.

Quietly she accelerated towards the two men, scattering bikers and sailors as she sped down the middle of the pavement and bore down on them, arms pumping on the wheels like an Olympic wheelchair sprinter.

She arrived just as the Leader took a windmill swipe at Gator, swinging her own arm back and following through with a leather slapping smash with her hand between the man's shoulder blades.

Even Time stood still.

The Leader didn't move for several seconds. Gator stared wide eyed, not daring to take his eyes off the Leader for a second, body coiled like a prize fighter.

The Leader very slowly pulled himself up to his true height, filled out his jacket with a ripple of cracking muscles and turned to face his new adversary. He blinked. There was no one there.

"ello my little darling!'" Becky bellowed up at him like she'd just found her long lost brother. "How are yer you old bastard, here have a beer," and she produced a pint from no one knew where of cold lager and pressed it into the man's still clenched sledgehammer of a hand.

It took the Leader several vital seconds to ponderously crunch through his mental gears. One moment he was going to kill an American, the next he had someone assaulting him from behind who he was going to grind into pulp first then kill, and now he had a beautiful girl with no legs grinning at him like a clown, treating him like her best mate and offering him a beer.

He finally made his decision, bent down, smiled and grabbed Becky in a bear hug, lifting her out of the wheelchair and swinging her gently around a couple of times before putting her down again. "I'm going great you little beauty, cheers mate" he yelled back at her, and swilled his beer down in one.

Becky's mates weren't quite as mellow. "What the hell are you doing?" they said as the crowd dispersed and the Leader and Gator disappeared with their mates into the nearest pub to spend the rest of the day together.

"They were going to kill each other" she said. "Couldn't let them do that could I."

"They could have killed YOU" they said.

Becky just smiled. She went into the nearest shop and bought a post card. With them all watching she wrote,

"Dear Doctor **********, just a quick note from your favourite patient from Australia. I'm STILL ALIVE. Love Becky."

Then she went to the post office and sent it.

Every month Becky sent the doctor who 10 years before had given her just months to live a post card from wherever she was in the world. "Just to upset him" she said.

"You cant be scared about living" she said in the pub afterwards. "If you're scared of living you might as well be dead already, because what would be the point? Every second I live is a second I shouldn't have, and I'm going to make the most of all of it. Besides, we're all going to die, and what will all this worrying be about when that happens?"

During the next three months Becky went horse riding, bungy jumping ('what, they put you in a harness do they Becky,?’ No you idiot, they tied the bungy around my neck!’), abseiling, scuba diving, whale watching, swimming with dolphins, drove by herself across Australia, broke down in the middle of the desert, got rescued by a truck driver, saw everything in the country she'd always dreamed of seeing and for good measure got pregnant.

Regrets? None.

The last morning I saw her she was in a local shoe shop with a group of bemused backpackers and a distraught assistant. Becky had been there an hour insisting to the poor girl she wanted a pair of shoes but couldn’t a find a pair that were her colour, fitted or a style that suited her.

An hour before she left we all went to the beach, and left Becky in the shallows when a huge wave came out of nowhere and threatened to wipe us out. We ran for it, listening to Becky in the background yelling “You bunch of ******’s, wait ‘til I get hold of you!”

I learned many things from Becky. I forget them sometimes when something happens that looks difficult, or I get nervous or unsure.

Then I remember, smile and do it anyway!

Article Source: http://www.content.onlypunjab.com

If you enjoyed this article, please 'rate it' by using the button at the bottom of this page. Thank you :o) 'Becky' isn't her name. I don't know where she is now, so couldn't ask permission to use her real name. I am an Australian childrens author, and present creative writing, memory and self-esteem workshops in schools. Our website: www.chocmint.com is an online creative studio where we work with writers and illustrators of all ages, creating and selling children's e-books. Visit now and you'll also find some great stories to download for FREE, just for visiting. I have a passion for mangos, the Greek Islands and bringing the best out of young people. I have an extraordinary family, and we are touring schools together in Australia, Europe and America in 2007, with great friend, artist, collaborator and cartoonist, Dave McCleery. If you are interested in booking us, please visit www.chocmint.com for details, and how to contact us.

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