Susan Mockler - Fractured

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: Fractured : a memoir / Susan Mockler.

Names: Mockler, Susan, author.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20220203970 | Canadiana (ebook) 20220204055 | ISBN 9781772602708 (softcover) | ISBN 9781772602715 (EPUB)

Subjects: LCSH: Mockler, Susan. | LCSH: Mockler, SusanHealth. | LCSH: Spinal cordWounds and injuriesPatientsCanadaBiography. | LCSH: Spinal cordWounds and injuriesPatientsRehabilitation. | LCSH: People with disabilitiesCanadaBiography. | LCSH: People with disabilitiesRehabilitation. | LCSH: Spinal cordWounds and injuriesPatientsPsychology. | LCSH: People with disabilitiesPsychology. | LCSH: PsychologistsCanadaBiography. | LCGFT: Autobiographies.

Classification: LCC RD594.3 .M63 2022 | DDC 362.4092dc23

Copyright 2022 by Susan Mockler

Cover by Natalie Olsen

Cover image copyright korkeng / Shutterstock.com

Editor: Diane Young

Printed and bound in Canada

The following versions of material from this book were previously published.

Collision, Ars Medica. Toronto, ON, Spring, 2007, 94101.

Fractured, Descant. Toronto, ON, Summer, 2010, 149, 100105.

Hey Sexy, Geist. Vancouver, BC, Summer, 2015, 97, 1416.

You Oughta Know, Wordgathering. December, 12(4), 2018.

Walking Class, Disabled Voices! Rebel Mountain Press: British Columbia, 2020.

A version of On Disability originally appeared in Voices From the FOLD: A Festival Magazine, May 2021 and THIS Magazine, Toronto, ON, May/June, 2018, Vol. 51, No. 6, 1213.

Second Story Press gratefully acknowledges the support of the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts for our publishing program. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund.

Published by

Second Story Press

20 Maud Street, Suite 401

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

M5V 2M5

www.secondstorypress.ca

O body swayed to music, O brightening glance,How can we know the dancer from the dance?

W.B. Yeats Among School Children

After such knowledge, what forgiveness?

T.S. Eliot Gerontion

We decided to leave early. There was something about the sticky summer heat of the city, the restlessness I felt sitting on Garys mothers couch, sipping decaffeinated tea, gray with milk, listening to Andy Rooney sign off on 60 Minutes, that made me want to flee.

Lets go tonight, I said as we drove back to Garys. Why wait until tomorrow morning?

Sure. He shrugged. Maybe we can get to Vermont by midnight. Stay over and be in North Conway tomorrow afternoon. He reached around the gearshift and squeezed my thigh. I like it when youre spontaneous.

His touch just below my cut-offs felt clammy, but I left his hand there and smiled. Impatient now for the cool mountain air, the stars silver against the clear night sky, I wanted this vacation. I needed this two-week escape from Ottawa, from my government job, and from the hollowness Id felt since separating from Daniel almost two years ago.

Back at Garys, I lugged a cooler to the car. I grabbed a bottle of Chardonnay. And some cheese and crackers for when we stop tonight.

Surprise flitted across his face. Thats romantic.

By nine oclock, we were on the road, Eric Clapton singing Tears in Heaven on a portable tape player in the back seat. The stereo in Garys ten-year-old compact car had stopped working the week before, so Id bought batteries, made tapes, and borrowed books on cassettes from the library. It was a long drive to the White Mountains. Eric Clapton was a compromise between our ages and musical tastes. Id left some of Garys favorites on his bookcase; I couldnt stand listening to Hotel California one more time.

Do you want to stop for a coffee? I asked after about an hour. Theres a rest stop up ahead.

Lets wait until were past Montreal.

Youre not tired?

Im fine.

Ill see if I can find somewhere for us to stay tonight. From the glove compartment, I pulled out a New England travel guide that Id picked up a few days before. Where do you think well end up?

Hopefully around Saint Johnsbury. But you might want to check on the Quebec side. In case we want to stop sooner.

I thumbed to the index, searching listings for Vermont. There was little light in the car, and I squinted to discern the names of hotels and motels near the border.

And then sometime between struggling in the dimness to read, sometime in that span of time between feeling the thin paper between my fingers, the smooth vinyl of the seat against my bare legs, the effortless turning of pages, sometime in that space from conscious thought and action to my next memory, the car hit a moose.

---

From a distance, someone was calling my name. I wanted to reply, to rise to the surface to greet the voice. But there was resistance as if a magnetic force were drawing me deeper and deeper into darkness: a darkness safe, calm, and unending. How easy to let go, to simply slip away, but I struggled and one thought formed: Not ready to die.

Susan!

I opened my eyes and returned to the world, trying to make sense of the chaos. Shouting, car doors slamming, flashing lights: red, blue, and bright white. The shape of a man hovering over me. Terrible. Something terrible has happened. I couldnt feel anything. I couldnt move. I was only mind. My body had disappeared.

Next, on an examining table, I gagged on something being forced down my throat. Susan. Swallow, a woman said. We have to insert this tube into your stomach.

Seconds? Minutes? Hours later? Can we cut your clothes?

Cut my clothes?

Yes. My first word, raspy and faint. My throat raw from where the tube had scraped it. Then through the static of machines, the hum of voices, came the soft swish of shears.