Day One with "The Chair"

We just returned from my first venture out into the public with the wheelchair. Tuesday is an off day for me and with it being around a windchill of 0 here, it would have been easy to just stay inside all day. But...what fun would that have been. It was too tempting to head down the road to a mall and sporting goods store. I figured going during a slow time of the week was the best idea for my first day out in public. Also, just to note that we took Ashley's car today which has a bigger trunk...so lesson learned from last night's troubles with my trunk.

The mall was the first stop and the first thing I noticed myself doing was looking for ramps as we went to our normal parking area. Sure enough there were plenty to choose from. As we entered the mall I told Ashley (my girlfriend) to look at people's faces to see what type of reactions we got. I would have kept an eye out for this, but I was too busy making sure I didn't run into anything. We made our way to the food court only with the occasional stare. Ashley got her food then came over to where I was going to get food from and helped me with that. Little kids seemed to have the most perplexed looks on their faces most likely wondering why an adult was in a stroller like them. Eating was not a problem as I was easily able to stroll up to the tables. Once we finished eating it was time to go exploring.

Next stop was American Eagle. Ashley still has X-mas gift cards to use and I was curious to see if the wheelchair would even fit in between all the clothing displays. Much to my surprise I had no problem getting around and in between everything. I'm sure if this had been a weekend day with more people shopping I would not have had the same ease of time. After we were done there I wanted to go somewhere downstairs which meant we had to find an elevator. You never really concern yourself where they are otherwise. The only one I remembered seeing was near the food court so we headed back that way. Then we perused downstairs just for a bit before finding another elevator to leave the mall.

Before heading back home we stopped by Sports Authority. Obviously being a big sports person I was looking forward to going in here and seeing how the chair maneuvered around. I was disappointed that although the main aisles were big enough, if I ventured off I was not able to fit between all the clothing racks. This made for a frustrating time since I couldn't actually see everything (even though I wasn't actually in there to buy anything).

Tomorrow will be an interesting day as I am sure my students will wonder what is going on. In my leisure activities class I am having them play basketball so I may join in since I am rolling in a made for basketball wheelchair. The other two classes are weight training that I mostly just supervise, but I am going to attempt to try some lifts to see how hard it is. One other thing I forgot to mention last night was the different perspective you get when your eyes are not at standing level. Leaving the campus building I noticed that one of my students is an All-American on the track team. Her picture is towards the bottom of the wall (which I walk by a lot) and I do not think I would have noticed that had I not been in the chair. So thank you Quickie GP for opening my eyes.