Labor Day is upon us once again. How time flies.
That means it’s been four years since I broke my ankle. How’d I break my ankle? Well, what I like to tell folks is that I was trying to rescue orphans from a burning building, but it’s hard to keep a straight face with that story. The truth though, is pretty humbling.
We had bought little aluminum kick scooters for the kids years earlier, and although I used them from time to time when camping or chasing the kids around the block, they were always too small for me. I had to bend over to reach the handlebars.
Then one day I saw an older lady riding what looked to be an adult-sized kick scooter through Spellerberg Park, and I thought, “That is for me!” Soon after I found them for sale at Shopko, and they were even marked down, and I bought one. And it was a fun ride!
The killer (or the breaker, in my case) was the little wheelie bar on the back of the thing. Bryce had pretty much mastered the wheelie on that thing, but I hadn’t tried it. At least not until that fateful day, September 1, 2002.
It was Sunday, and we were on our way a few blocks down Hawthorne to Neil & Luanne’s house for a get together. The boys and I were riding scooters, while Yvonne & Emily walked. As we were going up a little hill next to the Edison Middle School athletic field I decided it was time I tried a wheelie. It went very badly. I guess I pulled too hard on the handlebars as I stepped on the wheelie bar, and the front wheel went too high, tipping me backward. My right foot ended up in the way of my butt as it came down.
My foot must’ve been straight up & down, and wasn’t quite up to the task of supporting 85% of my weight, so the foot turned out, breaking the tibia in one place and the fibula in two. I heard the snap, and saw the foot do an unnatural flop when I pulled it out from under me. And oh did it hurt.
Yvonne was about 20 feet behind me, and saw me fall, but didn’t realize how serious things were. I’m afraid I got a little impatient with her — I knew it was serious enough for a visit to the emergency room, and she was a little slow in figuring out what to do. She was thinking of running back to the house to get the van to take me to the hospital, but we decided that an ambulance crew would likely do something to immobilize the ankle before loading me up. So she went to one of the neighbors & called for an ambulance.
After what seemed like way too long a time, the ambulance showed up. The ankle was really starting to hurt by then, and I was feeling a little shocky; cold, clammy skin, a little light headed… Well the paramedics hauled out the stretcher, and basically picked me up & threw me on. They did have Yvonne lift my foot, but they never did put anything on it to keep it from moving where it shouldn’t. I guess the van idea would’ve worked ok, and would’ve saved the insurance company about $500.
The end result was three days in the hospital, surgery, two plates, and a dozen or so screws to hold everything together until the bones knitted back together. The doc said if I were 12, things would heal quickly enough that the plates wouldn’t be needed. But 40 year old bones don’t heal like that… It was about six weeks until I was back on my feet, and about a year — and a second surgery to remove the plates and screws — before things were back to near normal.
So, after all that, you’re probably wondering what’s up with the title; what does a scooter and a broken ankle have to do with a guitar that isn’t mine anymore?
I’ve always wanted to play the guitar, and Yvonne reasoned that while I was laid up would be a good time to do that. So she bought a guitar and a lesson book for my birthday gift. The trouble was that I spent most of my days at home in a recliner with my foot elevated, which was less than conducive to learning to play the guitar. So, my recuperation time slipped away without learning to play. As did the next four years. I still don’t play the guitar.
Then this summer, Jeff and Melissa Waddell, who work with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) in Hawaii stopped in Sioux Falls for a visit. We had them and their kids over for lunch one Sunday, and one of the things Jeff shared was that they were breaking into a new ministry where they have been going to an island far to the south of Hawaii to help build rain catchment systems for the locals. Fanning Island, also known as Tabuaeran, is a coral atoll that rises only a few feet from the Pacific Ocean. Because of the size and composition of the island, fresh water is a rare commodity. There are no mountains, and wells provide only a very salty water. But, the area receives an enormous amount of rain every year, so a properly designed and built catchment system can provide all the water they need and more.
Jeff and his crew bring materials (on the Norwegian Wind) to help the locals get the fresh water they need. Because of the remote location of the island, they tend to spend weeks at a time there, so have come to know some of the locals quite well. Jeff told of an older blind gentleman who uses a guitar to lead praise and worship at church gatherings. The guitar he uses is incredibly old, is missing a string, and even has a hole worn in the front from all the years of strumming.
Jeff mentioned that he was hoping to pick up a guitar at some point in his visit to the mainland that he could bring to him. I reasoned that since my guitar had pretty much sat unused for so long, that would be a great new home for it. Yvonne thought the same, so off it went with Jeff, Melissa, and the girls. Jeff didn’t remember what the gentleman’s name is, but he did leave a photo, which I will scan and post at some point, and promised to take a photo of him with the new guitar. God has been good to me, blessing me far beyond what I would ever expect. It is such a cool thing to be part of blessing someone else.
Update: We just received a new photo from Jeff of Tewatu strumming on his new guitar… So cool! The old photo of Tewatu holding the old guitar gives a bit of an idea just how banged up the old one was; you can see where the wood is worn away just below his hand. I can imagine that the climate on a tropical island probably isn’t the best for keeping a guitar in good repair.
When Tewatu received the new guitar, Jeff wrote that Tewatu “spent a couple of minutes just running his hands over the smooth surface and counting all six strings,” before playing a song. He probably had to think back to remember how to play with all six strings!
Tewatu’s blindness is a result of the water situation on Fanning Island. Jeff tells us that when people used to get water from wells, it was slightly salty because of seawater filtering in from all sides. So the locals would get around the salty taste by adding a bit of sugar. All that sugar for so many years makes diabetes a huge problem for the people, and blindness is one of the end results of untreated diabetes. So the rain catchment systems can be a huge help for the people of Fanning Island.