Give Him the Chair

Fifty-year-old men shouldn’t be riding down their driveway on wheeled desk chairs. It’s a poor reflection on their level of maturity. It’s a bad example for those impressionable thirty-five-year-olds, and there’s always the chance of soiled drawers. Then again, it could make for some awesome home video.

It just so happened we had such a chair. A handsome five-wheeled, chrome and cloth model. Unfortunately, having seen its better days, it was doomed for the curbside pickup. As it was dark out when this judgement was handed down, it fell to me to carry out the sentence.

When I say I have a long driveway, believe me. If it was completely flat, you could run a hundred-yard dash on it. It’s that long.

From the house it drops about six feet on a rather unassuming incline. Where it flattens out, it crosses a culvert which provides drainage across our property. From there to the street it rises ever so gently.

Being very tired that evening, I couldn’t see myself bending over and pushing this dead-chair-rolling all the way to the street. Ever the thrill seeker I thought, “Why not have some fun?” I sat down and pushed off.

Fear was totally absent from my being. My rationale was, I could steer with my feet. How difficult could that be? What could possibly go wrong?

As I started downhill, my first impression was, “This is going to be way more fun than I thought. This old thing’s still got some speed in it!” I was amazed at how fast it glided over the concrete.

Kicking with my left foot, in an effort to keep myself on track, I began picking up even more speed.

The key phrase here is, “in an effort to.” My perception of how easy this was supposed to be was about to be trampled by a stampeding reality. My efforts at fun were quickly going awry.

At that precise moment I discovered an anatomical fact about myself. I have an honest-to-goodness lead butt. For still some unknown reason it decided to lead the race to the cataclysmic end for which I was headed.

Hurtling backwards now down my driveway, I realized my butt was in line for a little off-roading before eventually sailing off into the drainage ditch.

Did I mention I had lined the ditch with fieldstone last fall?

Common Sense finally roused itself off the couch of my well-being. Surveying the situation, it put in an urgent call to Self Preservation.

“S.P., we’ve got major issues.”
“What issues?”
“The Court Jester here is about to go off the deep end. Literally.”
“Okay?”
“He’s not gonna die, but there could be marks left. If only in his drawers.”
“Mmm hmm.”
“Things might get broken.”
“Oh my!”
“Worse than that will be the sermons, not only from his wife but his mother, too.”
“Man your stations! Prepare for a crash landing!”
“Can I transfer to a new unit after this latest fiasco is over?”

With the steep edge of the driveway drawing ever closer to the wheels, I can’t imagine why I had to think twice before acting.

Not a second after tumbling onto the blacktop I heard the sound of metal legs ricocheting off rock as the chair went solo into the ditch. I quickly got to my feet and scampered down the slope to retrieve it. No sense in getting the wife all a-twitter at this point if she decided to come outside.

I paused to reflect on the past ten seconds. I’d made it only a quarter of the way down my drive. Was thrown, once again, by a supposedly inanimate object. All my appendages appeared to be intact although without a thorough inventory I couldn’t be sure. I could call it “fun” this time because I wasn’t hurting.

Bending over, I pushed the chair the rest of the way.

Walking back, I checked for blood. At my age, oozing blood is a dead giveaway that I’d not thought things through to their logical conclusion. I could hear my mother’s voice: “Stop that bleeding right now or I’ll give you something to bleed about.”

There’s no doubt, fifty-year-old men shouldn’t be riding desk chairs down their driveway. Next time, I’ll just use my feet and surf it down the slope. Think of the potentially awesome video!


© 2006 Michael Wicinski