Lifting His Legs (for Poppy)

It's something he'd done thousands of times in his life.

And it was the last time i ever witnessed it.

And got a chance to help him.

His name is Robert William Stallcup, known to most folks as Bob. My father-in-law for the past almost 30 years and my friend for most of the prior ones, i'm one of the few who affectionately know him as 'Poppy'.

He contracted polio at the age of 21, just before he was to be deployed to Korea, one year before the vaccine became available. It left him with two paralyzed legs, two strong and overburdened arms and shoulders, and one stubbornly determined and seemingly indefatigable will and heart.

The disease kept him from his calling to the other side of the world. But it did not define who he is and how he lived his one precious life on this planet.

He spent his professional life calculating facts and figures, assessing risks and projecting futures. Like all of us, there were miscalculations and misprojections along the way. But when it came to embodying a gregariousness of opinion and a generosity of spirit, his life has added up to something utterly unique and preeminently powerful.

And he traveled through almost all of it on crutches and a wheelchair.

Part of Poppy's routine for over 60 years was transitioning himself from one place to another...from his bed to his wheelchair...from his wheelchair into the car...and back to his wheelchair. He has made these transitions mostly unassisted. His loving, patient and ever-supportive wife, Lori, was right there with him to help with loading up and unpacking the chair as needed (and in countless other ways over 54 years of marriage).

As the years passed by, he needed more and more help with these transitions. He discovered that using a strong and slick wood board to slide along eased his way from one landing place to another. An occasional tug on his belt from behind gave a needed lift to his behind.

But he always seemed to manage the movement of his legs on his own. At the appropriate time in his transitional routine, he would carefully lift them into or out of the footwell of the car, making sure that they were in the proper position with an adequate amount of room for him to maneuver without doing undue damage to them (quite a feat given that he could not feel them).

Over the years that i sojourned through life with Poppy, mostly at a distance geographically but certainly with a closeness of Spirit, i marveled at how such a wellspring of wisdom and willpower continued to emerge from the depths of his being. And while this propulsive passion certainly came out in his fiery engagement of politics (even as i regularly questioned the validity of some of his claims and most of his sources) and in his faithful giving of himself in time and talents, resources and revelry, laughter and love, there was something remarkable and revelatory for me as i watched and occasionally assisted him in his precise and painstaking journey of moving to and from his wheelchair.

In all the mundane motions and microscopic movements that motivate the molecules that make up this larger-than-life man to move, in all his perspiration that elicits inspiration, seldom have i experienced more patience and persistence in a person.

Sparely have i seen such sensitivity and strength in a person.

Barely have i felt more empathy and less pity for a person.

Rarely have i received more courage and encouragement from a person.

Poppy's time with us here came to an end last Saturday, 23 May 2020 at 1.43pm CDT. Fluid collecting in his lungs from untreatable heart failure eventually caused his system to stop moving, his lungs to stop breathing, and his heart to stop beating.

But back in April of 2013, on our first 'last' day with him (as he was on hospice care after being given 4-6 weeks to live...a hospice care that he was taken OFF of 10 months later in a miraculous turn around physically), as my family and i returned with him to his home, i got out of the car and went around to the passenger side door to help him out of the car and into his wheelchair.

One last time.

And as he heaved his body off of the seat and onto the board to slowly slide into his wheelchair, he asked me to do something i had never done before.

He asked me to lift his legs.

i tenderly took a hold of one at a time, raising each one up slowly out of the footwell and gently onto the driveway, feeling like cradling a newborn baby for the first time.

And i thought about how long he has had to arduously lug around these weighty, angular appendages. How these miraculous, muscular members were disabled by disease and rendered powerless by paralysis. How he responded to the cruelty of his fate with faith...by unearthing and using other gifts to overcome the obstacles that could have easily overwhelmed him.

And i imagined the day soon to come when those lifeless legs will have their sinews and senses shocked by Spirit, resurrected to run rampant in the realm of the Redeemer, destined to dance a jig in the Great Beyond, lifted to leap in the fields of Eternity

To finally fulfill his calling to reach the Other Side.

Where a day is like a thousand years.

Where the first is last and the last is first because there is no more first and last.

And i realize that this first 'last' time i witnessed the strength and spirit of Poppy was really a foretaste of the first time i will witness firsthand the Source of that strength and Spirit.

With all eyes lifted in majesty.

And all hearts awakened in infancy.

And all legs lifted in ecstasy. 

i love you, Poppy.