Soul Doctor speaks...: Parents series: How to hide a wheelchair at home

January 1, 2022

New Year’s Day, 745pm. I have been rearranging furniture at my pad since 2pm. I am happy and satisfied with what I have managed so far, did not lose any nails or break anything (yet) since I started. I am now stuck with a task at hand – where do I store my mom’s wheelchair? I tucked the chair down; it is a foldable wheelchair and I tried to keep it as compact as possible. Still, it is there, in my dressing studio – or what used to be my guest room, where parents slept when they visited me – when they were younger.

The folded wheelchair faces the wall, next to the antique dressing table that a friend gave me, opposite this odd-looking item is my glamorous, antique cabinet that house almost all my costume jewelry. The chair does not belong in this room, and yet, it does. For months it has sat here, since we bought it last September, after mom asked for it incessantly. It got quite a lot of use between September and November…before mom moved into the nursing home.

When she and dad moved from my building into the nursing home, this chair, and a foldable walking stick stayed behind with me at my pad. We have returned the rented pad to landlord and cleared out parents’ home; their home of one year and eight months.

I sat on the floor and stared at the silent wheelchair in the corner, facing the wall, as if apologizing to me for taking up space in my home. Tears rolled. I am feeling the silence of my home, a space that I love being alone in it. This is a sanctuary, a shelter, and a space for me to be crazy, be calm, be frantic, be happy, be sad, be myself.

In the past one year and eight months, I shared this space with my parents for hours every day. I was no longer “alone” in my home. I cooked for more than one person during those months, I incorporated caregiving time in my single-life, I learned to find joy in sharing my days and my life with parents – whom for more than two decades, were hardly in my life.

The first two weeks of them having moved out – were the weirdest and uncomfortable for me. I was confused, sad, guilty, and hopeful all of the same time. I often paused in my track, trying to register what it is like to be alone again. “What will I eat today?” Now that I don’t need to cook for them anymore… I really miss them, and yet I was glad to be rid of them so I can work all the time and let professionals take care of their needs.

Anyway, I let work sweep me up and consume me. I worked day and night. In November I was able to visit them once or twice a week, it balances my emotions. Then I worked all month of December, on the road, performing and selling albums, hustling with my work partners.

But I did not work on the last day of the year. I am so glad to be home. I spent the first part of NYE visiting my parents at their nursing home. We sat for two hours at the dining area of the home, me and parents. I watched them, alive, in person, smiling. The usual sight – dad, buried in his hand phone and iPad and occasionally joining our conversation; mom, basking in our attention and sometimes struggled to get cohesive story out.

I saw my sister too; we took a few happy family wefies before she had to rush off for a work lunch. I stayed back and was joined by my BFF See Ming who came over, sat there holding my mom’s hand and coaxing stories out of her, and trading stories with mom.

It was a perfect day. See Ming and I left the home eventually, when mom said, “It is shower time now.” See Ming and I hung out in a quiet mall, ate and chatted, and shopped.

And shopped I did…although I have seen my December pay cheques yet, I bought myself yet another antique cabinet – this one is to house my growing collection of glassware, whisky bottles, gin, sake and other assortments of happy, hedonistic, decadent things. I was so thrilled about this new furniture coming in two days, I just have to re-arrange, and adjust everything, to welcome another symbol of my singlehood (spinsterhood? Haha) – I can buy whatever furniture I want without getting anyone’s opinion.

That aside, so mom’s wheelchair remains in my home, folded and silent, waiting to be unfolded one day and serve anyone who needs its assistance.