Need is relative

Yesterday I delivered a scooter to a veteran down in Binghamton, NY. He was like most who get a scooter, able to get around. Many who met him would ask why should he get a scooter? The facts of his pain and inability to go very far are not obvious. True he's not as bad as some I've worked with who may be in either powerchairs or scooters, and absolutely can't get around without them. But that doesn't mean his quality of life hasn't been lowered by his physical problems. The  purpose of a scooter in particular is to improve your quality of life, making it possible to live as you want to. In many ways he reminded me of a guy I met when I first started selling Rascal. I did an in-home appointment with a man and his wife near Cooperstown, for a scooter for the man. If you walked in and met him he looked perfectly normal. You wouldn't see the back problems, and the emphsema. As we talked he said that while he loved his wife, and appreciated everything she did every day to help him, he resented the fact that he was no longer in control of his own life.  That he could no longer do even the simple things that he'd done without thinking every day of his life. 
There's nothing simpler for most people than getting their mail. He told me that for him to go to get their mail was a twenty to thirty minute trip in good weather. No, he wasn't driving to the post office in Cooperstown. He was just walking to the mailbox at the end of the driveway, about 100 feet from his door.  He said that to do it, he carried a small stool with him. He'd walk a few feet, sit on the stool to get his breath back, then walk a few feet more, over and over, out and back. 
When he and his wife watched me take the scooter out of the trunk of my car and assemble it, you could see the doubt in both of their faces they were in their 70's after all. I went over assmbly and disassembly with them and they working together were able to do it easily, putting it in and taking it out of their car. This was when cars still had big trunks. I could carry two scooters in the trunk of my Olds 98.
But driving the scooter was what convinced him. He drove the scooter for the first time, and he went right to the mailbox, and back, in about 30 seconds.  You should have seen the look on this guys face, I'll never forget it, he was normal, once again able to do one of those the things he'd done so easily all his life.  That's the purpose of getting the scooter, or a powerchair for those who need them, to regain as much control as possible.

Lee Murray