The Cremated Wheelchair
The Cremated Wheelchair Dave Wright The battered wheelchair rolled to a stop, its long-time occupant having recently made his final transfer to a waiting gurney. The remnants of a simple meal clung to its cracked vinyl arm like crumbling stucco. Its slumped seat, still warm from an old man’s body diminished by age and immobility, stared vacantly at the cluttered room. The living room, like the rest of the house was littered with stacks of yellowing newspapers. A tattered LIFE magazine—the last issue printed in May of 2000—lay on top of an end table buried beneath a mountain of assorted periodicals. “A Life Ends” headlined the magazine—one that completed a story that originated in its first issue in 1936 entitled “Life Begins.” A Bible, scuffed and worn, rested beside it. Furrows worn into a grubby shag carpet wandered like a maze from living room to bathroom to bed to kitchen. Chipped Styrofoam plates splattered with half-eaten meals shrouded the counter. Generations o