Breath

Martha Mason tells her story in Breath:  A lifetime of rhythm of an iron lung...Her life changed at eleven years old when polio struck her family in the late 1940s.  The prior year she was collecting for the March of Dimes (read about the concepts and implementation of this charity organization in Polio: An American story) to help in attacking the disease that frequently struck children and for which there was no known cause or cure.  In the span of a week in September, Martha and her brother Gaston both contracted polio.  Gaston was gone within a few days; Martha was paralyzed from the neck down and needed the assistance of an iron lung to force her lungs to expand and contract.  Doctors told both Martha and her parents she would not live a year, as her heart was too damaged to sustain her body.  She went on to live over 60 years in the iron lung, a record for the 800 pound machine.  Martha accomplished many goals despite her condition.  With the assistance of her beloved mother, she graduated from high school and college (as valedictorian of each class), and achieved her dream of being a writer.  Her parents were devoted to her, as Martha was to them, and this respect was shown in multiple examples throughout this recounting.
I felt, as I read this book, that I was within her collection of friends, visiting and gaining insight into her daily routines, tribulations, and joys, which is the prime reason I have referred to the author by her first name throughout this entry. Her outlook on life remained stoically optimistic throughout 60 years of changing caretakers, societal values, and technological innovations. It is of course difficult to imagine a life lived within a cylinder, but Martha shows she collected friends, "visited" many places, and sampled and debated literary delights in her created salon circle.  An amazing woman tells a moving story, from which we can all learn.

Online resources:
NYT article on Martha Mason http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/10/us/10mason.html?_r=1
YouTube documentary produced by Gardner-Webb University Media Relations; May 2004 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CiXFGc5ePVs&feature=related

Having been born too late to witness firsthand the polio epidemic, I read these PCL resources and learned a lot about the disease and its impact on American society:
In search of the polio vaccine [DVD] - a History Channel documentary
Polio: An American story by David Oshinsky