June 2001 - The first fall

It was the summer of 2001 and it was to be the most fabulous vacation for the three of us. Dick, Kevin and I flew to London. We were going to spend a few days in London, take the train through the Chunnel to Brussels and then Luxembourg, where my German friend Gaby would meet us. After a night at her house in Riol, Germany, we were going to drive with her entire family to a small village on the coast in Italy called Eraclea Mare, where we would spend 10 days on the beach with little contact with the outside world. But this was just the beginning and we had just landed in London. We took the train from the airport to Victoria Station and got on the escalator to go up to street level, where we would catch a cab to our hotel. This is another of those moments that Kevin and I will always remember.

Dick stepped on the escalator first, followed by Kevin and then me. Dick had our largest bag with him. About halfway up, Dick tumbled backwards, landing on Kevin, who fell back onto me. We were all sprawled upside down on a busy escalator. I screamed and someone at the bottom of the escalator hit a big red button to stop the escalator. I never noticed those buttons before but ever since that day, I am conscious of them every time I step on an escalator. And this was the last day that Kevin or I ever were downhill from Dick on an escalator.

People helped us off the escalator. Kevin and I were scratched and bruised and scared. Fortunately, Kevin had on a heavy backpack and that had protected his head and back in the fall., but we still were pretty shook up and bleeding. Dick had nothing at all to show for the accident and joked that he had it okay, because Kevin protected him from the fall. Kevin was 11 at the time and didn't see the humor, and neither did I. I was annoyed by Dick's seeming indifference to our suffering and was grumpy for days about that. It was one of those things that always just stuck with me. It didn't make sense until years later, when the doctor said "Progressive Supranuclear Palsy" and I found out that it normally starts with a backwards fall as the first sign. I wonder.....