Every couple of years, I swallow my pride, squelch my qualms, hoist my petard, and take a refreshing series of physical therapy sessions.

This year, I’m doing the deed at the KU Spine Center.  I’ve recently learned that most physical therapists secure doctorates, making them extremely well-qualified to administer the torture with which they pester and plague their patients.  No matter:  punishment justly earned, I say.  Get thee to the waiting room, keep a careful watch for your name to be butchered, and grit your teeth, young woman.  It’s time to beat back time.

Pleasantly surprised was I to see a tall, cheerful woman stroll out from the nether-reaches of the Spine Center and properly pronounce my name in a delightful accent.  She reached her hand forward to grasp mine and pump it briefly — up, down, pleased to meet you, Ms. Corley — then opened the door to admit me to the dungeon.  I followed her across the usual gymniasium filled with struggling invalids and stodgy taskmasters wearing scrubs.

The woman introduced herself and gestured to a chair for me.  She pulled a rolling chair towards a portable computer station and trilled, without hesitation:  “I need to assess your goals, because when I heard that I  had a new patient, I said to myself, ‘Oh my, they are sending me someone with spasticity, don’t they know that I can do nothing with spasticity!’ ”  Then she looked at me brightly while I digested this pronouncement and wondered, idly, whether her accent bespoke of France.

When asked, she invited me to guess.  I ventured Switzerland and evoked a long trill of hearty laughter. “That is what everyone says, but I am from this continent!”  She peered at me while I looked puzzled.  Then she crowed triumphantly, “I am French-Canadian!” and again came the long, lovely laugh.  To my inevitable and trite query as to how she found herself traveling southward, she smiled broadly and asked me, “Why does anyone move?  For love!” And I thought but did not say: What lucky man brought America this joyful creature? 

Ninety minutes later, I shook the same hand in thanks and stepped over to the scheduler.  I had been coaxed to agree to two sessions per week without protest, so effective was the logic presented to me by this most unusual doctor of physical therapy.  I had answered questions more honestly than I probably subconsciously intended and given a medical history that raised the woman’s eyebrows more than once.  She astonished me by agreeing that I probably should not use a cane, the first medical professional ever to understand and articulate the reasons — other than crass vanity — which I do not.  She had quelled any complaint that I might have voiced at some of the tests she performed by deft anticipation: No one likes to stand on my foam, she told me, so do not waste time telling me you do not like it because I will not be impressed!

She even managed what no one else has been able to do.  She got me to wear a gait belt without complaint.

Wonders of wonders — will they never cease?  We shall see, we shall see — when I visit, twice each week for the next two months, my new friend from North of the border.