Michael's Story

For months, Shirley Greer and her paralyzed brother, Michael Dixon, had been scanning the want ads.

If Michael's lot in life was ever going to improve if he was going to start a business or, even more fundamentally, if he was ever going to leave his townhouse apartment on a regular basis he needed wheels.

To be specific, a van, one big enough to be retrofitted with an electric lift and with enough headroom to accommodate his wheelchair.

They weren't easy to come by. Shirley dutifully looked through the classifieds and told Michael about the prospects, but often the price or the size of the vans in question made them unsuitable.

Late summer eased into fall and Michael remained just as homebound as ever.

The only time he left his apartment was for trips to the doctor, to take in a matinee movie and on several Sundays to attend church services at Grace Interdenominational Church. An ambulance took him to the doctor, but he depended on Metro Access Ride, a transportation service for wheelchair-bound individuals offered by the Metro Transit Authority, for the trips to the theater and church.

As good as it felt to get away from his apartment, he considered the whole process a hassle. The passage of four years had not made him forget how easy life had been before a stranger shot him three times.

In his previous life, he could turn the ignition on his white Mustang, and the world became one road after another to be explored.

Now he had to call ahead and schedule a time to be picked up at home and a time to be returned. It was not a process without faults.

One evening Michael and the home health nurse, who comes five days a week to give Shirl a break from her caregiver duties, went to Rivergate Mall via the Access Ride van.

For the return trip, Michael said he and the nurse arrived early at the pickup point outside one of the mall's entrances, but the van never showed.

Hours went by and stores were beginning to close.

"We were where we were supposed to be. They said we weren't, but we were," he charged.

Fortunately, a couple from Russellville, Ky., came to the rescue of the distressed young man. They owned a lift-equipped van because their son used a wheelchair. Since their son was not with them that night they offered to give Michael and his nurse a ride home.

Since that episode, Michael always made sure he was home before nightfall.

"I don't want to have to go through that again," he said.

In early October, Shirl was glancing through the used car advertisements and circled one for a full-sized Chevy Mark III van. It was a 1993 model, the same year as Michael's Mustang.

She showed the ad to her brother. The size was right, the price was affordable. "Let's call them," he said.

The number belonged to Jay and Lisa Ward. They were a young couple from Hendersonville who in less than a year went from zero to six kids. In November 1996 they adopted five brothers, ages 5 to 14, from a Siberian orphanage. Two months after bringing their new sons to America, Lisa learned she was pregnant with a daughter.

Suddenly, the van they owned wasn't big enough. So the Wards upgraded to a larger vehicle and placed the Mark III on the market.

And Michael bought it.

After so many months of frustration, striking the deal was anticlimactic. It was almost too easy.

"This has got to be from God, just no way around it," said Shirl.

The Wards, including the five boys and their baby sister, accompanied the van to Michael's apartment off Brick Church Pike. When they arrived at dusk on an October evening, Michael waited for them inside the apartment, sitting in his wheelchair.

As the Wards signed a bill of sale, their boys crowded around, fascinated by the young man who was tethered to a breathing machine. Michael told Mrs.

Ward to pull down the blanket that covered his chest and she would find the money in an envelope.

"You can count it on the bed," he told her.

The woman formed small stacks with the bills as the boys looked on in silent, wide-eyed wonder.

"That is a lot of money," whispered 14-year-old Vova in a thick Russian accent.

It was a lot of money, most of it the fruit of Michael's frugality, along with some assistance from Nashville agencies that help wheelchair-bound individuals. In some respects, however, Michael considered his deal the bargain of the century. It was hard to explain to the Wards, to anyone, just how much of a life changing force this vehicle represented. It meant freedom, mobility, opportunity, all the things that were abruptly taken from him by the paralysis. Is there an unfair price for such emancipation? It was priceless, he thought.

Leaving the van's key on the bed, Mrs. Ward ushered her troops to the door.

"Paka," several of the Ward brothers cried out to Michael.

"What's that mean?" he asked.

"It means, "See you later,' in Russian," Mrs. Ward explained.

"Paka," replied Michael, beaming like he had just won the lottery.

He did not see his van up close until the next day, when Shirl rolled his wheelchair to the driveway.

Michael would not go for a ride in his new vehicle until the lift was installed, which could take 90 days, according to a spokesman for the Tennessee Division of Rehabilitation Services. The state agency is arranging for the retrofitting.

Perhaps the van will be ready by Christmas, he thought. A present to himself might be a trip to church, or a Kroger expedition, or a visit to his mother's home in Linden, two hours to the west.

The destination did not matter to Shirl, who will do the driving.

"I'm going to take him wherever he wants to go," the sister said.

For the first time in a long time, Michael once again felt like he was going places.