Keep your blood off of my seat cushions. I had no sensation, and all I could see was the yellow of my severed tendons covered in what appeared to be tomato juice. I was crushed by my right leg and lost consciousness. When I awoke, all I could make out under the bus were pieces of tubing and the undersides of huge tires. My mother and I were loaded into a taxi; her left leg was amputated below the knee. I distinctly recall thinking that I’d be missing my ballet lesson when I was four years old. The hospital stairway’s wobbly ceiling was the next thing I can recall. I was put on a stretcher so the physicians could carry me to the emergency department because there was no elevator. My mother’s room was on the sixth floor of the hospital, while I was on the fifth floor.
I couldn’t use a cane since I had just amputated my right leg, so I had to move my body on a stool to go to my mother while no one else was present. I frequently tumbled down the stairs since it is risky to use a stool on the stairs. When I lived in China, I frequently used the stairs to get to school and to visit my mother in the hospital, first with a stool. Later, I used a prosthetic leg.
