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DISABILITY MATTERS:
'Come On-A My House'

CBC News Viewpoint | June 24, 2005 | More from Disability Matters


This column will feature three writers, each with a different
disability. They all have something to say about living with a
disability and how they view awareness and attitudes toward disabilities
in Canada. The column will deal with the rights of people with
disabilities, eliminating inequality and discrimination, and issues of
self-help and consumer advocacy. Our plan is to rotate among our
columnists to have a new column each month.


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 Ed Smith is a retired educator and full-time writer. His humour column
runs in several papers and magazines and he has had eight books
published. He has been quadriplegic since 1998. Ed lives in Springdale,
Nfld.


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I was about five feet off the ground when the slightly less than 585
pounds of wheelchair and me suddenly and without warning dropped a foot.
At the same time my heart rose approximately the same distance in my
throat.

Two things need to be made clear here. First, most of that weight was
wheelchair. Second, only one side of the chair dropped. Anyone who lives
in a chair knows this made it infinitely more scary.

I was trying to get out of a friend's house using my 10-inch-wide
aluminum ramps. There were six steps leading up to the deck from the
ground. The only way to get up or down was to place one end of my
14-foot ramps some distance out from the bottom step (to make the
incline more gradual) and the other at the top of the deck.

I had managed to get in by cautiously inching up the ramps. The weight
buckled and swayed them alarmingly, but with the help of two strong men
pushing we made it to the top.

I was trying to exit the same way, except now I had to control the chair
down the steep incline. The ramps had to be just the right distance
apart at the top and bottom, not to mention the middle, to keep my
wheels from running off them.

I wasn't doing this for the fun of it.

During my 17-month hiatus in rehab facilities in Newfoundland and
Toronto all I could think of, like most Newfoundlanders who have to be
"away," was getting back to the Rock. I knew that being quadriplegic
meant that our lives had changed forever but I was seeing that change in
rather simplistic terms.

I knew I wouldn't be hiking my hunting and fishing trails through the
hills anymore. And my wife and I wouldn't be chasing whales and schools
of fish in our boat and "boiling up" on isolated beaches anymore. I knew
from now on I would have to hire other hands and feet to do the many
things I had always done for myself, and that would range from dressing
in the morning to pursuing my several hobbies and everything in between.

But I wasn't prepared to live my life under virtual house arrest.

We were and are blessed with many good friends. We were going home,
against the advice of my doctors in Toronto, to a small town on the
northeast coast of Newfoundland. But the quality of life we foresaw
there was based in no small part on once more being among family and
friends. Neither of us was prepared for the grim reality.

I couldn't get into the houses of most of my friends.

Like houses in many other parts of Canada, most Newfoundland homes are
built on full basements, which lift the house several feet above ground
level. The entrances are therefore almost always several steps up. My
state-of-the-art wheelchair could not climb them. The episode with the
ramps was thus my first attempt to get into a friend's house.

On the basis of that successful entry I was flying high and had a most
pleasant evening. As the song says, "leavin' wasn't even on my mind."
Not until, that is, I actually started to leave and had to stare down
the length of those flimsy aluminum ramps. That was when the chair took
the frightening lurch.

The bottom end of the left ramp had started sliding out along the grass
causing the top end to slip off the top of the deck. Fortunately that
top end just managed to catch on the first step, otherwise ramp, chair
and I would have fallen in a rather undignified and painful heap. As it
was I don't know why the chair didn't slip off the ramp or tumble over
sideways. It was a scary moment for all concerned.

Other friends made heroic efforts to get me into their homes but decided
the risk of heart attack, theirs and mine, just wasn't worth it. There's
only one couple whose house we can access on a regular basis and they
live in Florida half the year!

Pima County in Arizona has the first Inclusive Home Design Ordinance, or
visitability law, in the U.S. and possibly Canada, as well. The
ordinance requires that new single-family homes have at least one
entrance with no step, and doors must be a minimum of 32 inches wide. It
also states that ground-floor bathrooms should have reinforced walls for
grab-bar installation, door handles of the lever type and wall switches
no higher than 48 inches.

It doesn't sound like much but it's a start. With all the talk about
universal housing being only talk as far as specific regulations are
concerned, it's good to see at least one jurisdiction prepared to fight
the good fight for accessible homes. In 2003, the Arizona Court of
Appeals in a unanimous judgment disallowed a bid by the Tucson Builders
Association to have the visitability law declared null and void. It's a
safe bet it won't be the last challenge.

My own gut feeling is that I'll be older than Methuselah's cat before I
can wheel up to any new home and simply make my way in. But the baby
boomers are getting older and there's going to be more of us than ever
who'll want to get into each other's homes, as well as hotels,
restaurants and other public buildings.

No, such homes won't cost a fortune, and no, it won't be the end of
creative architecture. In fact, it will be the beginning of new
challenges to builders and designers as they attempt to accommodate
those amongst us who want to be as free to be as everyone else.

I wish they'd hurry. Both my heart and my social life are showing the
strain.




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