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Mrs. Kidder is training friendly nurses and family members to take care of John so that they can spell her for a few hours. The children—Susan, 9, Bruce, 7, and Tommy, 2—run in & out of their father's room with their friends, as naturally as if his illness was nothing unusual.
But John Kidder is not deceiving himself. He knows that medical science has no prospect of being able to make him well. He is simply determined to enjoy his life as he must live it. Usually he passes the day on the rocking bed, but he often gets into his wheelchair for family dinner. He reads a lot and has been given an automatic page turner. Once a week, four men come in for bridge. (It takes an extra man to handle Kidder's cards.) If the weather is good, he can go for a ride, wearing his portable respirator.
And each week, by dictating to his wife, John Kidder does a column ("Sittin' and Rockin' ") for the Ronan Pioneer (circ. 1,425). This month, appealing for contributions to the March of Dimes, Columnist Kidder recalled his doctor's reassuring words early in his own illness: "Don't worry about the hospital expense, John—the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis will take care of it." It has. So far, in the care of John Kidder, the foundation and its chapters have expended at least 140,000 dimes.