Ev

(Written in 1970)
 

The phone call came in the afternoon, on a day just shortly before school was to let out. All the weeks of waiting that followed were quiet, sullen, worried weeks when no one laughed very much and conversation was at a standstill. Ev was coming home.

I remembered the day he'd left to go overseas. Now he was in a hospital somewhere in Tokyo. We were told that the hospital was bombed on the day he arrived and the nurses, unable to move to better shelter, piled pillows on top of those patients, including Ev, who were unable to crawl beneath the beds or get to safety.

The weeks went by terribly slowly until we learned that Ev was being brought back. They said he was alive, and that was the important thing, but there would he one vital difference; he would never be able to see again.

The first day I went into that hospital ward was the first day I realized what a thing called war could do.

No one would ever claim that adjusting to permanent blindness at the age of nineteen could be easy, but we would always admire Ev for the courage he showed from the start. Even though there were, of course, times he grew depressed, he never lost his sense of humor. Each time we came to the hospital Daddy would ask if he was still chasing the nurses and Ev would say yes, but he'd had trouble catching any. He joked about going to the "head" and not being able to find his way out again. A nurse, unaware that he was blind, had asked if he would like any magazines. Ev had said sure, and could she please find him a copy of Playboy in Braille?

On the very first day home, Ev went into the bathroom and after closing the door yelled for us to come and look. Alarmed at first, we all rushed to see what was the matter and were surprised to find what we thought was nothing out of the ordinary at all. We asked what was wrong and Ev said nothing was, except that when he'd come into the room, he'd forgotten and turned on the light.

That summer was one I'll remember forever. Ev learned to walk with a cane, and plans were begun for attending a special school for the blind in Chicago. We spent every warm, balmy day that we could out walking or sitting on the lawn in the sun with the radio playing all those summery songs over and over; drenching ourselves in greasy, sweet-smelling suntan lotion. Ev used to tease me and say he could do something I couldn't because he could stare straight unto the sun and not look away.

When we weren't out in the sun or walking or playing the radio, we'd patronize the TV set. Ev lived on iced Cokes and bologna sandwiches -- as many a day as Mother could manage to produce. He smoked more than we thought he should, but no one tried to tell him not to.

Family friends and relations came from everywhere to see Ev, and many stayed over for several nights. That was the time the dinners became banquets every evening, and after meals we all gathered around the piano and sang songs until we could hardly sing any more.

I taught Ev to play "Taps" on the guitar, and he performed it for every new group of visitors and once every night before bed.
One weekend, when we had a house full of guests, a special meal was prepared in honor of a relative's birthday. Ev, who had also lost the hearing in one ear, was unable to tell when Mother began saying Grace and promptly broke into a rousing chorus of "Happy Birthday."

The summer ended: and with the preparations underway for his schooling in Chicago, Ev got ready to leave. "When I get there," he told us, "I'm going to sneak up behind all those other blind people and say 'Boo!'"

We saw him onto the plane at the airport, and I wondered as we watched it taking off how long it would be before we would see Ev again. I knew that the adjusting, for him, was far from over. I wondered if it ever would be. He has to start his life over again; we have to carry ours on as before. But I'll remember that summer, I know, for as long as I live: every time I hear those summery songs or smell the smell of suntan lotion or sing a chorus of "Happy Birthday"...
 

JEANNIE PEACOCK
Written in Grade 12