Today || Volume 3

Today Cole asked me why some people walk different than other people. When I probed into his question, he specifically asked "why do some people have wheelchairs? How do they get into bed?"

He couldn't have asked a better person. I grew up with a disabled person near and dear to my heart. My grandfather (Cole's middle namesake) suffered from Multiple Sclerosis and it's debilitating effects from the early 1970s until his death in 2003. How did my grandfather get into bed? My grandmother lifted him in using a Hoya lift. In later years, it was my father who did the heavy lifting. How did my grandfather get up and down his stairs? With a chairlift. I drew a picture of the chairlift for Cole and then he decided to draw a picture of my grandpa. He asked me all the different kinds of food Grandpa liked and then he drew those. He asked me if Grandpa ate apple sauce and pears and I told him that grandpa loved pasta and salads and steak and artichokes. I didn't tell him how much Grandpa loved me and how much I loved him. I did tell Cole that I photographed Grandpa when he was in the hospital, but I didn't tell him that the purpose was to document the many expressions of a usually stoic man who never complained about his lot in life.  I also photographed Mom, the dedicated wife who stood by Grandpa and never batted an eye to help him. One day I will tell him these stories and show him those photographs that I captured on slide film. 

I love that Cole did not try to draw a wheelchair but instead drew Grandpa with an arrow for a foot. The rest of the items around him are the many foods he is eating.