Max

Maxcountry, originally uploaded by Tawny Fowler.

My family decided to visit my grandfather one day out in Columbus, Georgia. The man in the photograph is not my grandfather, but my great uncle, Max. This was the first time I have ever met him or I think any of my grandfather's siblings. He has like six or eight (I forget, I researched my father's lineage and it seems that they all have a bunch of kids, sometimes married more than once, and they pass names down as well, it gets confusing after a while), and the only other one I can remember seeing was at a funeral, and it was his own (first time I ever saw a dead body, and he was smiling...? kinda nice). The other guy in the background is my own uncle who told me the story of how Max lost his arm. When he was four years old, he was playing alongside a railroad track near his home when a train came rumbling down the tracks. Max wanted to stop it before it got to him so he held up his hand, I guess thinking it would see him and stop. Obviously it didn't so my great uncle has gone practically his whole life without his arm. It made me think about how weird that would feel, probably because I have had my arm longer and would really like to keep it. When I tore my scapula muscle earlier this year, I was forced to not move my arm or shoulder much due to the stabbing, aching pain I would cause my body; but you can't seem to help feeling a pull when you go to grab something that involves using both hands or arms, regardless of impending pain or not. So does he still do that? Does his shoulder reach to chase a cat out of his garbage or to grab something that's almost out of his reach from above? I'm sure he's had to maneuver eating and drinking and opening doors and catching a ball quite differently than most.
In this photo, to me, he has this look that he is not quite sure what is happening to him anymore. He's old, my grandfather's old. Max moved in with my grandfather because he cannot take care of himself anymore. That's an even scarier thought to me than losing an arm. Losing your mind.