local food market advertised to fill a couple entry-level positions, applicants stood two-deep around the block. Some brought sleeping bags, coolers, and lawn chairs. Crack cocaine became the new industry, homicide and arson the new hobbies. As the decade wore on, Money magazine surveyed three hundred major U.S. citiesfor their livability; Flint was three hundredth. Few who lived there were surprised, though they cloaked their reactions in outrage.
We were okay. Dad was selling beer. Folks always had money for beer. Mom was an attorney. Folks always needed a way out of trouble. We had food to eat, clean clothes to wear, and plenty of pallets to carve up and burn.
Years before, I’d worn down my parents on the subject of the prosthetic limb, so by my freshman year I couldn’t have said whether it was in a box in the garage or in a hospital storeroom or in a city landfill or on some other kid’s arm. As I’d neared the end of elementary school, the last place I saw it was on the floor of my bedroom closet, there with five sneakers that were too small or tattered, toys I’d outgrown, a pair of snow pants, and a plastic bat split along its seam that one day could be brought back to life with duct tape. “I haven’t worn that in a long time,” I thought, “I don’t think I ever will again.” While I was glad to be rid of it, that arm held more than cables and bands. It symbolized my parents’ efforts to help me. Their intentions were good and pure, and I felt a responsibility to them, though not enough to wear it. I felt bad about that. Sometimes, as heavy as it was on my shoulder, it was heavier on the floor.
The arm was in the clothes closet because that’s how I thought of it—as a part of my wardrobe, along with the pants and shirts and jackets I wore to school. It went on in the morning and came off the moment I walked through the front door at the end of the school day. The stump socks were folded in the sock drawer of the dresser. The elastic bands that operated the pincers but wore out so fast sat in a tangle on the bookshelf. “Where’s your arm?” Mom would ask before breakfast. “Where’s your arm?” Dad would demand as I gathered my lunchbox and homework. Some days I’d huff away, return to the closet, strip off my shirt, strap on my arm, and stomp off to school.Others, I’d plead for a respite, just one day off, promising to wear it again the next day. Eventually, gloriously, there were no more tomorrows for my right arm, though twenty-five years later a man I didn’t know contacted me, said he was in possession of my arm—guaranteed it—and asked if I would like to buy it back. I was mortified, though less so when he described what he had, and it turned out what he was hoping to sell could not have come from my closet. It was a left arm.
The back-and-forths with my parents petered out when I was maybe ten, when they’d recognized I was better off finding my way with what I had and, anyway, they had tired of the sulking arguments about it. I couldn’t hold a bat with that thing, couldn’t swing a hockey stick, and couldn’t even run without it clattering against itself and whatever else was nearby. The technology that was supposed to be extending my physical boundaries was keeping me off the playground at recess and slowing me to a walk. The best it did for me was to grant the motivation to be rid of it, which meant working the right arm I had until it became more reliable. My true arm was thin and slightly short and lacked the mobility of my left arm, but it had some life in it. Not having fingers was problematic, but my wrist worked okay. With my right arm, I could push things around, wedge things between my forearm and body, trap things, hold things steady, carry things with some nimbleness, and that all seemed to be a reasonable place to start. I was forever staining the right side of my shirts, where I cradled oranges in order to peel them and bike parts in order to fix them and
We were okay. Dad was selling beer. Folks always had money for beer. Mom was an attorney. Folks always needed a way out of trouble. We had food to eat, clean clothes to wear, and plenty of pallets to carve up and burn.
Years before, I’d worn down my parents on the subject of the prosthetic limb, so by my freshman year I couldn’t have said whether it was in a box in the garage or in a hospital storeroom or in a city landfill or on some other kid’s arm. As I’d neared the end of elementary school, the last place I saw it was on the floor of my bedroom closet, there with five sneakers that were too small or tattered, toys I’d outgrown, a pair of snow pants, and a plastic bat split along its seam that one day could be brought back to life with duct tape. “I haven’t worn that in a long time,” I thought, “I don’t think I ever will again.” While I was glad to be rid of it, that arm held more than cables and bands. It symbolized my parents’ efforts to help me. Their intentions were good and pure, and I felt a responsibility to them, though not enough to wear it. I felt bad about that. Sometimes, as heavy as it was on my shoulder, it was heavier on the floor.
The arm was in the clothes closet because that’s how I thought of it—as a part of my wardrobe, along with the pants and shirts and jackets I wore to school. It went on in the morning and came off the moment I walked through the front door at the end of the school day. The stump socks were folded in the sock drawer of the dresser. The elastic bands that operated the pincers but wore out so fast sat in a tangle on the bookshelf. “Where’s your arm?” Mom would ask before breakfast. “Where’s your arm?” Dad would demand as I gathered my lunchbox and homework. Some days I’d huff away, return to the closet, strip off my shirt, strap on my arm, and stomp off to school.Others, I’d plead for a respite, just one day off, promising to wear it again the next day. Eventually, gloriously, there were no more tomorrows for my right arm, though twenty-five years later a man I didn’t know contacted me, said he was in possession of my arm—guaranteed it—and asked if I would like to buy it back. I was mortified, though less so when he described what he had, and it turned out what he was hoping to sell could not have come from my closet. It was a left arm.
The back-and-forths with my parents petered out when I was maybe ten, when they’d recognized I was better off finding my way with what I had and, anyway, they had tired of the sulking arguments about it. I couldn’t hold a bat with that thing, couldn’t swing a hockey stick, and couldn’t even run without it clattering against itself and whatever else was nearby. The technology that was supposed to be extending my physical boundaries was keeping me off the playground at recess and slowing me to a walk. The best it did for me was to grant the motivation to be rid of it, which meant working the right arm I had until it became more reliable. My true arm was thin and slightly short and lacked the mobility of my left arm, but it had some life in it. Not having fingers was problematic, but my wrist worked okay. With my right arm, I could push things around, wedge things between my forearm and body, trap things, hold things steady, carry things with some nimbleness, and that all seemed to be a reasonable place to start. I was forever staining the right side of my shirts, where I cradled oranges in order to peel them and bike parts in order to fix them and
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