Adaptive Accessories, Coping Part II, The Jelly Bum.

I never did have great circulation; always the Princess feeling the Pea. With Parkinson’s it is worse. The chairs that don’t cut off blood to my left leg and foot make for a very short list. To compensate, I have The Jelly Bum: an orthopaedic gel seat.

I’m sitting on it now!

I use it at my Vancouver desk

 and at my desk in Saint Louis.

It goes everywhere with me thanks to a jazzy African print carry bag we had made for it in Saint Louis.

Abdoukhadre gets to make it work with his wardrobe if we’re together…

I take it on the bus in Vancouver

 Handling it on a crowded bus requires a technical routine of hold/movement patterns – like a baton twirler – never varying the holding position (tucked under my left arm so I can use my right for bus-entering business) nor the standard swing into place movement (so that it lands predictably right side up in the right direction in the right place for me to sit on it before the bus lurches forward).

and in the taxi in Saint Louis du Sénégal.

I take it to my doctors’ offices

(where if my hand is shaking too much, the doctor takes the photo…)

and to the chiro’s.

I take it on holiday: to Whistler

in the lobby of Nita Lake Lodge

and on the Whistler Gondola

where there’s nothing but a narrow ledge for sitting during the 25 minute ride so I brought my own chair too.

The Jelly Bum is essential to every phase of our trip Vancouver – Dakar: in the airports; on the wheel chairs; and in the bucket seats of Air France Premium Voyageur Class. To avoid the appearance of yet another carry-on bag, the jazzy African print carry bag is replaced with a simple, white, fitted shopping bag that leaves no doubt as to the orthopedic purpose of the object in question.

(Aéroport Paris CDG: our encampment between flights)

I take it out for dinner - to Baan Wasana Thai Restaurant in Vancouver

 and for drinks at the Harmattan Bar in Saint Louis.

I took it to see the demolition of our family’s home of 50+ years

and to our construction site in Saint Louis.

 It too was a victim of our Burglar who stripped the Jelly Bum down to reach into its fleshy innards looking for cash…

The Jelly Bum is so essential, so precious, so unavailable in Sénégal, that I sent a backup one with our furniture arriving by container ship any day now….