One of the most useful (and expensive) pieces of equipment in Mom’s life with ALS is our Toyota Sienna rampvan.  It happily transports her and her motorized wheelchair wherever she wants to go, so long as there aren’t any speed tables.  Or large bumps.  Or some small bumps for that matter.  I appreciate the thing but I’m convinced it’s possessed.  It is at the very least extremely temperamental.  You can almost hear it speak.

Most of the time it works just fine.  Sometimes though it gets annoyed and refuses to put out the ramp.  Or the side door on the driver’s side won’t open.   No amount of attempts will succeed when it is in this mood, save for two.  If we take it to the dealer, it cooperates with no problem.  Naturally, it doesn’t want to look like it needs fixed, it prefers to make us look like morons.  Or, the sure-fire method for getting the van to pay attention:  asking someone else in the house to come out and look at it.  It works every time.  If our friend is having trouble with the van wanting to do it’s normal duty, all she has to do is walk in and tell me.  In the time it takes me to walk outside, she presses the button to show me and voila!  The van works perfectly!

It’s possessed, I tell you.  Perhaps we deserve it.  One of the world’s orneriest families winds up with an ornery van.  It seems sort of fitting.