The Ultimate Wheelchair Ramp
June 12, 2011
If you take the elevator to the top floor, you can navigate the main exhibit hall of the Guggenheim Museum in a chair without pushing. You just have to brake it a little with your hands in order to maintain a reasonable speed the whole way down. Which is REALLY fun, or would be, if there weren’t so many people around. I wouldn’t want to trash their ankles with the stainless steel footplates. No, no, I wouldn’t want to do that.
The gradation of the rise is not consistent, either. There are 12-ft. runs where the incline increases necessarily on each floor at the same point on the elipse. Every time you come to one of those, you are going to fly. The palms of your hands will burn from the friction, and even if you have the strength and control to manage the chair, the crummy, smooth rubber wheels will lose traction on the slick floor, and … well … heads up, people, here you come. Even if you throw both chair brakes AND use your hands, you are GOING to keep moving, no question.The most difficult part of the whole course is the final descent–an EXTREMELY steep slope that I will refer to as the Ramp of Ruin, just for the sake of our story. I have survived the Guggenheim’s legendary Ramp o’ Ruin many times with a patented method of speed reduction involving a complicated hybrid of braking techniques. I’m telling you, the lady with the bad carrot-hair-dye-job who was standing at the bottom of the ramp yesterday is lucky I know these things. I could’ve taken her out like a bowling pin. (Incidentally, I have created an illustrated pamphlet detailing the complex procedure. I call it “The Ramp o’ Ruin: A Modest Proposal.” If you or someone you know will be visiting the Guggenheim and making use of a chair in the near future, you can write me to request one. Be sure to include an SASE).
So, the real story did not happen on this trip. The real story happened a long time ago when my friend Brian and I visited the museum together. There were so few visitors on that particular morning, the rotunda looked like a wide-open, glistening spiral expressway. We started on the sixth floor and began to wind down and around. Now, Brian is a very funny guy. He carries an invisible backpack of laughter on his shoulders everywhere he goes. He can turn a serene museum into Ringling Bros. in a hot minute, and on that day, he did. The instant we exit the elevator, he begins the “ramp games,” all of which are designed to make me grip the chair in utter terror. On one floor, he lets go of the handles for a second before catching me. I gasp. He laughs. On the next floor he jumps on the back of the chair and rides as we hurtle around a curve at a stunning velocity. He jumps off and stops the chair by digging in his heels just in time. I shriek. He laughs. This goes on and on. After a while, I am laughing, too. I begin to roll my eyes when he tries to scare me. (We DID actually look at the art. A little bit).
Then, at the close of our Guggenheim visit, we approach the Ramp o’ Ruin, which neither of us has experienced before. Things would have turned out differently if we had. Seeing his chance to get in one last game, Brian jumps on the back of the chair for a final, tragic ride.
I holler over my shoulder, laughing, “Give me a break, dude! I am so over this. It doesn’t even scare me anymore. Get off the chair and let’s go …”
That’s when I notice how fast we are traveling.
“Hey! Quit! That’s too fast!” I yell, clinging to the armrests. We don’t slow down.
Then I glimpse something in my right periphery and turn to discover that Brian is running BESIDE the chair with a terrified expression on his face. He weakly indicates the rubber handle grips that have COME OFF IN HIS HANDS!
We look at each other and scream.
There was NO WAY I was trying to stop the chair by myself, okay. It’s all fun and games until someone gets her hand lopped off at the wrist, kids.
Basically, I owe my life to the dutiful museum guard who threw himself in front of me like a Secret Service agent.
Wherever you are, you brave navy-blazer-wearing museum guy, I thank you.
