Jet Ski Joe

My friend Joe is 18 and back when he was seven he was hit by a truck as he crossed the street near his home. That accident has left him severely handicapped; most professionals never thought that Joe would live through the injuries. Today, Joe is in a powered wheel chair and has very limited use of his hands and struggles mightily with communication, for which he relies on sign language.

Joe has been coming to our church for about the last three and a half years.

Three years ago Joe went to Florida with the youth group and had a good time at our annual Student Leadership Summit during Easter break. He has taught me so much that I almost feel like I should pay him to go. He is a very compassionate, thoughtful, young man who longs to be “normal”.

This year he was very ready to go again to Florida and we left on Easter night, driving south to near Panama City Beach, to a place called Laguna Beach, Florida. We had great weather the entire week in the 80’s which was a real treat for us Michiganders.

One of the many highlights of the Florida experience is our Jet Ski trip and this year was going to be great because we were able to get a deal that would allow all 24 of us to Jet ski out to Shell Island and back a two hour tour!

It was a beautiful day that April 20^th and all twenty four of us were on twelve Jet Ski’s with two additional skis that held the leaders who would guide us through our afternoon journey. As it worked out Joe was with me and we were both good with that. To put Joe on a Jet Ski was a task that required four of us lifting Joe from his wheelchair and someone in the water holding the jet ski still. First we tried to get Joe to sit in front of me on the ski but my arms are too short. (Former co-workers used to call me T-Rex for this very reason.) So, instead, we tried Joe on the back of the ski holding on to me, he has a great grip and it seemed like it was going to work out. To be honest, I was somewhat nervous, not sure if he would have the stamina to make it for the whole two hours hanging on with his death grip.

We were the first ski loaded and were trying out the arrangement in the lagoon as everyone else loaded up. We took the last position in the single filed line as we motored through the “no-wake” zone. Finally, about a mile out, we got to hit the gas and go. Joe seemed to like to go fast over the warm Gulf waters. We often caught up to the ski in front of us then we had to slow down because the leaders wanted us to remain in a single file so it would be easier for them to keep track of us. Every five or ten minutes I had to slow down and adjust Joes hand grip because through all of the bouncing his hand migrated too far south. We had a great time hooting and yelling over the waves. The path that we took out to the island was very smooth since it was guarded by the island on the south and the mainland on the north. We made stops for people to hunt sand dollars in the bay and then at the island I got a break after about an hour of riding. I was wondering about my stamina at this point not Joes! Alex, Joes awesome caregiver, sat with Joe as the rest of us hunted sea shells on, go figure, Shell Island.

The last bit of the journey for us lay ahead; little did we know that it would be the most dangerous part of the day as well. To Be Continued...