Table for two

    

Dedicated to my mother

Mary Margaret (Sullivan) MacInnis

14 May 1919 - 4 July 2003

    For most of my young life, I had a long-standing date at a table for two with a very significant person – my mother. Though she never stood me up (well, she did, but that’s explored later), she did hand me off to a brother or a sister, and even Dad, from time to time. Our table for two wasn’t in any fine dining establishment with all the accoutrements of a formal meal. Au contraire! Our table, custom-made based on a design set out by my father, and ultimately finished with a lovely red stain, applied by my mother, had a prominent place in the TV room of our family home. The table was my childhood exercise table, around which many activities took place when it wasn’t used for its primary and intended purpose. Four times a day, the ‘torture table’ as I called it would be called into service to accommodate a range of exercises that were done ‘to’ my legs, as the implications of cerebral palsy required that my lower limbs be made stronger with help from many pairs of hands, with the most significant pair belonging to Mom.

    Each session would begin with me sitting on the edge of our table for two after Mom rolled out a long folding cushion and placed a sheet over it – shades of physiotherapy at rehab. Ugh and Yuck!! First up, while I was already seated I was to sit with scrawny legs dangling over the table edge, extending first the left leg, then the right, alternating for 10 reps; 15 if I was up to it. I’d be hanging on to the edge of the table so I didn’t flop over to the side. Next exercise, sitting without hanging on to the table, with spine straight, while Mom pushed with just her index finger, on left shoulder, then right, pausing between. The goal was for me not to fall over, and not grab onto the table edge. Learning sitting balance was critical to graduating to more stable standing, stepping and walking balance. The joy of it all!

    Now for the really fun part of our table for two date – Mom would lay me on my back with pillow under my head, and while sitting on the edge of the long red table, she’d place her hand over the knee of the leg furthest away from her, to work the muscles of the leg closest to her. With a grasp on my ankle, she’d bring the leg, bending at the knee slowly up to my chest. It took months and months for the knee to actually touch the chest. All part of the process of loosening spastic muscles. Ouch!!! Ten reps. Ten ouches! Then the opposite leg and more ouches. Sometimes tears. It hurt!! Sometimes screaming – I didn’t want to do this anymore; I didn’t want to do this ever again. Just leave me alone! My eldest sister wanders through with an offer – just do it and get it over with and she’d take me out for ice cream.

    With tantrum out of my system, on to the next course – I’d be rolled on my stomach, and again the legs, each in their turn would be bent, with heel touching buttock; 10 reps for each leg. After this bit, there’d be a relaxing break while Mom massaged my back, from waist to neck, then each leg and foot. While she was massaging the feet, she did heel cord stretching, pushing the floppy flat foot, toes to ceiling, then pulling downward; 10 reps of each for both feet. I was sooooooooo not enjoying this. It wasn’t time for dessert just yet.

    Feeling rather like a piece of meat in a rotisserie oven, I was turned to lie, first on the left side, for more leg raising and stretching, then onto the right to repeat the process. Almost finished. Mom helped me sit up and then stand, with flat, socked feet on the floor. I had to lift one foot, and hold to a 10 count; repeat. Ten reps. If I could do it without hanging on to the table, great; if not, that was okay. Then there was the swinging the leg forwards and backwards and out to the side with the same ten reps for each leg. Yay! Almost done for the session – final course for this table for two date – walking around the table wearing the leg braces – there was to be no table touching. Five times, then done. Then, ice cream. I was a bottomless pit as a child so there’d be a burger and fries. The food went in, but no weight was gained. And so it is today. Thin as a stick. I take after my table for two date. Mom was thin her entire life, as was my eldest sister, my ice cream date. There would be another seating at the table for two after dinner with only ½ portions of each course. It was important allow time for a bit of relaxation with television. At just before bedtime, another brief date, but this time with an audience. While Mom did her thing with my legs on our long red table, my brothers and sisters were piled into the TV room doing their own thing, while Dad was ensconced in his chair in the corner, doing what he did so well, after a long day – napping! His evening cocktail with ice cubes melting, resting on the corner of the ‘torture table’.

    The table for two dates with Mom went on for many years, close to thirteen, in fact, until I made the decision that I’d had enough. It was at that point that the table officially ceased being the ‘torture table’ and took on a life of its own as the ‘go-to’ spot for many activities. This multi-purpose gathering place was set on heavy-duty casters, as it served many functions after it ceased being the torture table of my childhood. It became the place where Mom engaged in a newspaper puzzle popular in the 60s – Match The Twins, with the occasional fly-over of an escaped budgie as he screamed ‘Crazy People’ – his vocabulary was extensive. Thankfully, he never mimicked my wailing and carrying on, while I was trapped on the table for tor – er - therapy.

    Dad kept an assortment of medical journals on the shelf below, and I often read bits of this and that in those journals and still have interest today in many things medical. Also on the shelf was a box containing the current rug kit I was working on – rug hooking was a form of therapy to strengthen my spine and teach my body proper ‘sitting balance’ as arms were outstretched, one hand holding the bit of yarn, and the other hand holding the tool to draw it through the stenciled canvas. Those finished ‘therapy rugs graced my parents’ home for many years until being presented to me upon my mother’s death.

    The great red table also served as a place where brothers would play cards, eat pizza, where we’d play board games with playmates from next door or across the street, or with brothers and sisters who taught the younger amongst us how to play scrabble, Monopoly, and array of such games. As we grew into adulthood, an elder brother would sit on the sofa, at one end of the table; cigarettes, ashtray and rye and cola at hand; a younger brother would come through with a slice of home made pizza fresh from the oven; often he’d bring a plate through for me – I was well looked after. Plates, empty glasses, magazines, newspapers, the stuff of living were scattered across the top of that table. As we moved out and off to university, we’d come home and once again we’d hang out around the table for two that was the table for four, six, 10, dozens. Many people sat around that table over the years. Friends of my parents who would drop in for drinks and conversation. School mates from university who would visit for weekends, helping themselves to whatever was in the fridge and bringing a thrown together meal to ‘the table’ to share with whomever might be roaming around the house at the time.

    Other/new people now live in the house, the home of my youth and the Table for Two is gone, but the memories I have, from the time my tiny self was first lifted up and laid down on it to the last meal my brothers, sisters, and others gathered around it to share, will live on. No one in my family will ever fully appreciate what that table and the dates with Mom meant for and to me. Many little bits of who I would become were woven into those table dates. At the time, I hated them, but now, the adult me can look back and fully appreciate that my mother hated them as much as I did but I, she, and we ‘had’ to make the dates at the table if I was to become the person I am today. Thanks, Mom! ☺

Carla MacInnis Rockwell is a freelance writer and disability rights advocate living outside Fredericton, NB with her aging Australian silky terrier and a rambunctious Maltese. She can be reached via email at carmacrockwell@xplornet.ca