A Tale of Two Ceilings

Ceilings torment me.  I can recall the day that the doctors entered my hospital room and coldly announced that I'd never walk again.  After they departed, I was left alone with my thoughts.  Laying on my back I found myself staring at the ceiling.  So as to not dwell on the depressing news, I started counting the random perforations in the ceiling tiles.  When I lost count, I'd start again, and again....  That little act of insanity was keeping me sane.

So I slowly recovered and made progress but never recovered the ability to walk.  I could still stand if braced and supported, but that ability only goes so far.  I remain a prisoner of my wheelchair.

In the subsequent years I accomplished a great number of tasks which I was told I would be beyond my ability.  Still so many more were out of reach for my world was now within a "bubble" where I could independently go only so far left or right, forward and back and up or down.  As a proudly independent person, that loss was the most devastating of all.

Having moved to a new house several years ago, I decided to redecorate.  While I did paint the walls and most of the ceiling, I wasn't able to get close to the light fixture with the paint-roller (on an extender).  No matter, I would get it when the light fixture was exchanged for another.

My friends and family always offer help but it is on their timetable.  I'm impatient and want to accomplish tasks immediately when I see them calling out for service.  "We'll do that later," "not now," or "leave that for another time" annoys me for I found out long ago that if something is out of sight, it is also out of mind.  Another time may never come.  Repeated pleas for help often are deferred and chores remain undone.

I am too proud to beg; repeated requests become "badgering"; I have never ordered anyone to do anything, and so I remain quietly frustrated with my own lack of ability to complete tasks which were so easy to accomplish a number of years ago.  I now wait and wait for charitable service when that someone's mind remembers and the their body is willing.

So now I lay in my new room--freshly painted some three years ago, and stare at a different ceiling.  There was no time allowed for me to finish painting the small area beneath the previous light fixture.  "We'll do that later."  I was grateful that my friend exchanged one light for another--his dirty hand-print on the white ceiling reminds me daily of the help he extended.

 

 Arrows point to hand print smudge and beige halo around light fixture.

Nightly, I look at that beige halo on a white ceiling which encircles my light and find it a reminder of my inability to accomplish so many of even the most simplest tasks.  I doubt it will ever be painted in my lifetime.  How can such a small thing be so devastatingly depressing?

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