Out of My Mind

I can’t talk. I can’t walk. I can’t feed myself or take myself to the bathroom.
Big bummer.
My arms and hands are pretty stiff, but I can mash the buttons on the TV
remote and move my wheelchair with the help of knobs that I can grab on the
wheels. I can’t hold a spoon or a pencil without dropping it. And my balance is
like zip—Humpty Dumpty had more control than I do.
When people look at me, I guess they see a girl with short, dark, curly hair
strapped into a pink wheelchair. By the way, there is nothing cute about a pink
wheelchair. Pink doesn’t change a thing.
They’d see a girl with dark brown eyes that are full of curiosity. But one of
them is slightly out of whack.
Her head wobbles a little.
Sometimes she drools.
She’s really tiny for a girl who is age ten and three-quarters.
Her legs are very thin, probably because they’ve never been used.
Her body tends to move on its own agenda, with feet sometimes kicking out
unexpectedly and arms occasionally flailing, connecting with whatever is close
by—a stack of CDs, a bowl of soup, a vase of roses.
Not a whole lot of control there.
After folks got finished making a list of my problems, they might take time to
notice that I have a fairly nice smile and deep dimples—I think my dimples are
cool.
I wear tiny gold earrings.
Sometimes people never even ask my name, like it’s not important or
something. It is. My name is Melody.
I can remember way back to when I was really, really young. Of course, it’s
hard to separate real memories from the videos of me that Dad took on his
camcorder. I’ve watched those things a million times.
Mom bringing me home from the hospital—her face showing smiles, but her
eyes squinted with worry.
Melody tucked into a tiny baby bathtub. My arms and legs looked so skinny. I
didn’t splash or kick.
Melody propped with blankets on the living room sofa—a look of
contentment on my face. I never cried much when I was a baby; Mom swears
it’s true.
Mom massaging me with lotion after a bath—I can still smell the lavender—
then wrapping me in a fluffy towel with a little hood built into one corner.
Dad took videos of me getting fed, getting changed, and even me sleeping. As
I got older, I guess he was waiting for me to turn over, and sit up, and walk. I
never did.
But I did absorb everything. I began to recognize noises and smells and tastes.
The whump and whoosh of the furnace coming alive each morning. The tangy
odor of heated dust as the house warmed up. The feel of a sneeze in the back of
my throat.
And music. Songs floated through me and stayed. Lullabies, mixed with the
soft smells of bedtime, slept with me. Harmonies made me smile. It’s like I’ve
always had a painted musical soundtrack playing background to my life. I can
almost hear colors and smell images when music is played.
Mom loves classical. Big, booming Beethoven symphonies blast from her CD
player all day long. Those pieces always seem to be bright blue as I listen, and
they smell like fresh paint.
Dad is partial to jazz, and every chance he gets, he winks at me, takes out
Mom’s Mozart disc, then pops in a CD of Miles Davis or Woody Herman. Jazz
to me sounds brown and tan, and it smells like wet dirt. Jazz music drives Mom
crazy, which is probably why Dad puts it on.
“Jazz makes me itch,” she says with a frown as Dad’s music explodes into the
kitchen.
Dad goes to her, gently scratches her arms and back, then engulfs her in a hug.
She stops frowning. But she changes it back to classical again as soon as Dad
leaves the room.
For some reason, I’ve always loved country music— loud, guitar-strumming,
broken-heart music. Country is lemons—not sour, but sugar sweet and tangy.
Lemon cake icing, cool, fresh lemonade! Lemon, lemon, lemon! Love it.
When I was really little, I remember sitting in our kitchen, being fed breakfast
by Mom, and a song came on the radio that made me screech with joy.
So I’m singin’
Elvira, Elvira
My heart’s on fire, Elvira
Giddy up oom poppa oom poppa mow mow
Giddy up oom poppa oom poppa mow mow
Heigh-ho Silver, away
How did I already know the words and the rhythms to that song? I have no
idea. It must have seeped into my memory somehow—maybe from a radio or
TV program. Anyway, I almost fell out of my chair. I scrunched up my face and
jerked and twitched as I tried to point to the radio. I wanted to hear the song
again. But Mom just looked at me like I was nuts.
How could she understand that I loved the song “Elvira” by the Oak Ridge
Boys when I barely understood it myself? I had no way to explain how I could
smell freshly sliced lemons and see citrus-toned musical notes in my mind as it
played.
If I had a paintbrush . . . wow! What a painting that would be!
But Mom just shook her head and kept on spooning applesauce into my
mouth. There’s so much my mother doesn’t know.
I suppose it’s a good thing to be unable to forget anything—being able to keep
every instant of my life crammed inside my head. But it’s also very frustrating. I
can’t share any of it, and none of it ever goes away.
I remember stupid stuff, like the feel of a lump of oatmeal stuck on the roof of
my mouth or the taste of toothpaste not rinsed off my teeth.
The smell of early-morning coffee is a permanent memory, mixed up with the
smell of bacon and the background yakking of the morning news people.
Mostly, though, I remember words. Very early I figured out there were
millions of words in the world. Everyone around me was able to bring them out
with no effort.
The salespeople on television: Buy one and get two free! For a limited time
only.
The mailman who came to the door: Mornin’, Mrs. Brooks. How’s the baby?
The choir at church: Hallelujah, hallelujah, amen.
The checkout clerk at the grocery store: Thanks for shopping with us today.
Everybody uses words to express themselves. Except me. And I bet most
people don’t realize the real power of words. But I do.
Thoughts need words. Words need a voice.
I love the smell of my mother’s hair after she washes it.
I love the feel of the scratchy stubble on my father’s face before he shaves.
But I’ve never been able to tell them.