Strange day (second in a never-ending series)
In truth, this strangest of strange days happened one and a half weeks ago, but I still haven’t quite recovered from the fact that, for a few short minutes, I was standing in my underpants (not just my underpants, but my trousers were certainly round my ankles at the time) in front of the ageing, double amputee father of a leading Tory politician. To be fair to him, he was actually very friendly - the father, I mean, not his leading Tory politician offspring, who sadly wasn’t present to witness such a climactic moment in the erosion of my dignity - and had obviously seen this all before. Oh yes. Fellow standing between parallel bars, trousers pooled at his feet, being fitted with an almost grotesquely basic and homemade prosthetic limb. Been there, done that, brought the false leg along with me, old chap.
Just this one audience member would have made me feel quite embarrassed enough, thank you very much, but there were in fact two of them. Leading Tory politician’s dear papa was chatting away amiably with another elderly gent of equally refined breeding, as they watched this innocent, wide-eyed youngster - well, I didn’t have the heart to tell them that I’m in my mid-thirties - being fitted with his first prosthesis. Maybe I was imagining it, but I couldn’t help but detect a possible hint of fatherly pride in their benevolent gaze as they viewed yet another new member receiving the bizarre initiation into this rather exclusive club. Perhaps it was just their appearance, but for some reason they reminded me of an upper-crust but rather more polite version of Statler and Waldorf from The Muppet Show.
Despite the somewhat unusual situation, for the first time since this - for want of a better term - Missing Leg Business started, I no longer felt like I was a patient or some extraordinary medical case. Everyone was very friendly, down-to-earth and resolutely non-medical. After all, they’ve seen missing limbs come and missing limbs go, albeit generally departing with various devices strapped onto them. Indeed, the whole experience felt more like being given an MOT in a delightfully genteel vehicle workshop rather than treatment in a hospital.
Dennis - the aforementioned bearded, camp, middle-aged prosthetist introduced in a previous entry - advised me at one point that the newly-fitted first version of my prosthetic limb would have to be adjusted. I immediately began envisaging some complex medical procedure carried out in a clinically sterile environment, but he interrupted and shattered my illusions as he cheerily informed me that he was “just going to pop next door and get a spanner, and then I’ll see if I can adjust this bolt”. Bolt? Spanner? This sounded lethal. I considered running, running like the wind out of these crazy surroundings filled with serenely smiling people, before quickly remembering that I was still at the stage where I would fall flat on my face if I so much as attempted staggering two steps forward. Oh well.
And so it was that Statler and Waldorf had a superb ringside view as - trousers now pulled back up round my waist, I’m pleased to say - Dennis merrily attacked my false leg with the assorted contents of his toolbox. Having made the necessary adjustments to my equipment (ahem), he turned his attention to the leading Tory politician’s father: “I’m ready for your legs now, Mr ———-. I’ll just see if I can get the annoying creaking in your feet sorted out”. Within a few minutes, I had become an old hand at all this. I knew the score. I barely batted an eyelid as Dennis picked up a pair of lower legs from the floor and carried them out of the room. I realised that the ‘complex procedure’ he was about to carry out would probably involve little more than a few quick squirts of WD40 on the affected moving parts, followed by a few gentle taps with a hammer. Maybe he would check the oil gauge and the tyre pressures while he was at it, too.
Oh, I suppose you want to know about the leg, don’t you? You’ve seen the Paralympic athletes on TV, and you’re already imagining some sleek, lightweight, shiny black metal appendage that allows me to leap and bound like a veritable gazelle. Well, I hate to disappoint you but … no, not quite. Of course, this was only Prosthetic Limb mk1, but even I was somewhat alarmed as Dennis proudly presented me with a rubber-tipped metal pole attached to a rigid, see-through plastic socket. There was no foot to be seen. Not even a movable knee. It was the original peg leg. However, since to these eyes it looked more post-apocalyptic cyborg than Long John Silver, within minutes I had christened it my Mad Max chic apparel. I’m still hoping that even after I have my proper limb, they will let me keep this one to wear to fancy dress parties.
It’s lethal. I could take somebody’s eye out with this thing. Or worse. Indeed, my main worry has been that I might inadvertently goose someone with it as I wheel down the corridor to the canteen, proudly thrusting a large metal cattle prod in front of me.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean for us to become intimately acquainted quite so quickly. Don’t blame me. Blame the leg. I call him Max. Mad Max. Have you been introduced? Oh yes, you have. Oops.”