Poster Child Read Free

the way I had been revealed and made vulnerable in the street. I was afraid that if I arrived at the dorm last, people would think it was because of my disability, and they would either pity me or look down on me. Both thoughts were equally intolerable and made me almost physically ill. I was afraid to put my full weight on the leg; this created an uneven gait and made the lip of the socket dig painfully into my left hip. I tolerated this pain, because it was normal and expected: part of living with a prosthesis. I had grown up wearing a progression of wooden legs that grew taller as I did, until in college I was fitted with a state-of-the-art prosthesis that was the model I will wear, with various modifications, for the rest of my life.
    I felt sweat pooling at the bottom of the silicone socket, making it slip and chafe against the small ankle bone on my stump (the residual limb), creating sores that would later itch and bleed. Still I walked on. I knew the torn skin would heal after a few days, and I could not lose. If I arrived last, I thought, I would be nothing but a cripple.
    By the time I reached the dorm, I was hobbling and in a great deal of pain, but making it back was the only thing that mattered to me. I was thrilled to be one of the first to arrive at the meeting point. I felt a rush of relief mixed with a kind of intoxicating pride.
    I went upstairs and scrubbed my hands clean in the sink at the end of the hall. I walked to my room, put my ruined clothes in a plastic bag, and removed my leg. It was hot and stinking between my hands as I held it upside down and peered into the hydraulic unit. With the Allen wrench I had thrown into my suitcase at the last minute, I tightened the hydraulics, bending the leg back and forth until the knee moved as stiffly as possible; now I would be able to tell when and if it loosened. I also cleaned out sand, dirt, oil, and dust that had collected behind the knee joint. Finally, worried that the leg smelled badly, I gave it a light mist with my favorite French perfume.
    I had been unaware of what was going on with the leg. Because South Korea had been such an adjustment in so many other ways, I had neglected my prosthesis. Adapting to a new language, weather, and all the other aspects of a different culture was important, but now I realized I needed to keep an eye on the leg, too. I scolded myself for not thinking of this earlier. Angrily, I thought, Why should I have to deal with this shit? The rest of the Fulbrighters seemed magnificently composed and carefree; for me, wearing shorts in public was a big deal, and I did it very rarely. I took a deep breath. In my head, I listed all my accomplishments—this made me feel better. Bitterness and anger would never help. I had learned to manage my disability by putting on a determined smile and believing that with the right adaptive strategies—the right clothes, the right attitude, and a sense of humor—I could adjust to any situation. I revisited those coping mechanisms and told myself that everything was fine: I was here, wasn't I? For now, that would need to be amazing enough.
    After I applied antibiotic ointment to the wounds I had acquired while walking home, and had cleaned out the sweaty silicone socket with a towel, I reassembled myself. With years of practice, I reattached the leg in less than a minute. I rolled the silicone back over the stump, put on the polyester-and-spandex Soft Sock, slipped the stump into the leg, tucked the socket's string through the hole on the side of the leg near my right inner thigh, pulled it tight, fastened the Velcro side of the string to the corresponding strip on the artificial thigh, and then twisted my stump inside the leg a bit to be sure everything was secure. I folded the sock over the leg's edge and pulled up the flesh-colored hose; they gripped the top of my artificial leg like the thigh-high stockings sold in lingerie stores. I carefully smoothed out the fabric near the ankle so it