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He sat parked in the ugly yellow hallway, waiting; a cranky old man in a wheel chair who almost everyone disliked.  Everyone that is but me. 

Albert was nearly eighty when we met.  I was doing my required patient contacts for my Paramedic, just killing time at a nursing facility in BFE, because we didn’t have a community hospital close enough. 

The first day I met him he looked at me in his strange, crooked little way, sizing me up.  He smiled wickedly and said, “I’m wet.”

Without missing a beat I said, “Hi Wet, I’m Dan.”

Albert followed me around the facility all day, banging into stuff, intentionally; he just wanted someone to notice him.  I finally turned around, knelt and looked deep into his dark, deep eyes.

“You keep driving like that they’re gonna take away your wheels, bro.”  His face was slack, left ear mangled and his nose had been broken more than mine.

“They can’t,” he said. “I’m a veteran.  I served my country in WWII and Korea.”  He sat up a little straighter.

“Oh, which side were you on?”  His laughter was geniune, and judging by the length of it; a long time pent up.

“You’re a damn smart-ass aren’t ya?” 

“That’s Mr. Smart-ass to you.”  I said grinning. 

I spent the day with Albert at my side, we talked about the service; he told me what it was like being a black man in the Army in WWII, about being in Korea in the winter.  Slowly, he painted a picture of life afterwards, his kids, his job with Bethleham Steel, getting fired for being drunk, and boxing.

Albert had been a unknown pug.  He’d spent twelve years fighting nobody’s for chump change; four concussions, missing his front teeth, a bad eye and then the lucky punch that had paralyzed him.  He’d been in the chair for nearly thirty years.

As the day went on I noticed, people avoided Albert.  None of the staff seemed to do anything with, for or around him. It was like they didn’t see him.  I finally asked the Head Nurse.