A Special Fan

If you want to find Rickey Baker, it’s pretty simple.Every day, he’s propped up in his wheelchair in the lobby of Ridgeview Nursing Home in Jasper, Alabama, wearing his favorite Alabama cap and smiling a million-dollar smile. It is here, in this sun-spilled foyer, that visitors and residents congregate, that paramedics in black cargo pants hustle through with their gurneys, and that scrubs-clad CNAs scurry around like concerned squirrels. And every day, Rickey blissfully takes it all in, gazing out through the window that shelters him from the cruelties of the outside world.Rickey came to Ridgeview five years ago when his aging mother could not give him the adequate care he needed. And it’s where he’s been ever since. You can be sure that he’s a staff favorite, and that he enjoys the attention from all the pretty nurses. “Rickey likes the girls,” assures Billie Henderson—a nurse on Rickey’s hall—with a wink. “But he’s the most humble person.”Rickey is one of the 400,000 Americans affected with Down syndrome, the most common chromosomal disease in the world. One in every 691 babies born in the U.S. (that’s 6,000 every year) will have Down syndrome, a condition that, according to the National Down Syndrome Society, “occurs when an individual has a full or partial extra copy of chromosome 21.”But Rickey has also been bitten by a bug that is contagious in this part of the earth, an illness called Alabama football. His diagnosis is grim. Rickey’s room at Ridgeview looks like it has been soaked by a tidal wave of crimson. Three pillows festoon the bed: a dark crimson one with the old Alabama logo; a furry red one with Rickey’s name etched on top of it; and an elephant stuffed animal that doubles as a pillow. Above the bed, a bulletin board is awash with all things Alabama: small posters that say “Back-to-Back National Champions” and “Title Wave,” a picture of a winking Nick Saban, a key ring with the illustrious, swooshing “A”, and a cross-stitched ‘Bama flyswatter hanging from a tack. A door beside the bed leads to a closetful of crimson: t-shirts neatly prepared on plastic hangers, signed footballs still in their cardboard cases, and a jersey with a peeling 99. Tonight, he will crawl under a houndstooth throw and drift off into a peaceful sleep.Although he’s never been to a game, Rickey always cheers for his team and wears his Alabama gear with pride. “He’s been a big Alabama fan all his life,” says his sister and sponsor, Freda Earnest. “When he was home, he wouldn’t miss watching a game. He wouldn’t even let his mother turn the channel. And if Alabama lost, he’d be mad a week.”Rickey’s prized possession is an autographed football by former Alabama Head Coach Gene Stallings, whom Rickey had the opportunity to meet several years ago at Carl Cannon Chevrolet in Jasper, after Ben Humphries, a local Hospice worker who works at Ridgeview, arranged the meeting. Stallings and Rickey immediately hit it off (Stallings had a child with Down syndrome who died at 46), and Rickey left the meeting with a football signed by the famous coach. Rickey also has an autographed football from Nick Saban and a second autographed ball from Coach Stallings and twelve former Alabama players. Freda admits that Rickey sometimes gets the coaches confused. “He called Stallings ‘Bear Bryant,’” says Freda. “I said, ‘Rickey, you’ve got the wrong coach!’”When asked, Rickey insists that his favorite out of the Big Three (Bryant, Stallings, and Saban) is Saban.“Savan,” he says softly.Thirty years ago, the life expectancy for people with Down syndrome was only 25, but today, people with Down syndrome can live up to 60 years of age (which makes Rickey’s life even more remarkable as he nears the ripe old age of 66). And what a life he’s had.Rickey grew up in Jasper and attended North Highlands School and West Jasper Elementary School. After Rickey lost his father when he was only five, the family moved to Franklin County for a few years, to the little community of Hodges, population 286. “When we lived in Hodges, Rickey had a stick that he used for a gun. He had a dog—a collie I believe it was—named Shep. One day, we woke up and we couldn’t find Rickey. Rickey’s uncle, who lived close by, eventually found him. He was out in the woods, sittin’ on a log and the dog was by his side. He said they had been rabbit hunting,” Freda says.Rickey’s disability has not deterred him from riding a bike, taking banjo lessons, working at a poultry plant, remembering family birthdays, singing Gospel songs, touring the Grand Ole Opry, and cheering for Alabama. “He had a three-wheeled bike that he would ride. He used to take me for rides in the basket,” says his niece, Traci Earnest Ferguson (who works—where else—but the University of Alabama).Later, Rickey attended a program called Life Skills Unlimited, which taught him the requisite skills to be able to work at Marshall Durbin, a local poultry plant. Rickey worked there for several years. “They basically made him a job,” says Freda. “They gave him nets for him to open up so they could put the chickens in. He loved getting up and going to his job. He wouldn’t miss work even if they had to wheel him in. In his latter days, he came to work using a walker. And if he wasn’t 30 minutes early, he was late. He pushed himself to go to work.”Freda recalls a story that demonstrates Rickey’s obsession with Alabama football. “When he was working at Marshall Durbin, a lady gave him an Auburn shirt. I don’t know if it was a joke or what, but Rickey said, ‘I won’t wear that,’ and she took it back.”But Rickey has had another obsession in life that has more eternal ramifications. “He is super religious,” Traci says. “My grandmother always had everyone in church, and Rickey went faithfully until it was hard for him to work. So then he would watch preaching on TV and sing gospel songs.”The staff at the nursing home brag on Rickey’s singing, too. They say it’s a blessing to hear him sing.Back at home, Rickey prayed every single night and before each meal. “He wouldn’t put a piece of food in his mouth until he blessed it,” says Charles Earnest, Freda’s husband and a local accountant. And while Rickey’s mother doted on him, he took care to return that love in a very touching way. “If mama was havin’ a hard time, Rickey would put his little hand on her and pray for her,” says Freda.Rickey faithfully attended Northside Baptist and later, Birmingham Avenue Church of God. “He had his seat,” Freda laughs. “When he got there, if someone was sitting in it, he’d say, ‘You’ve got my seat!” And though Rickey was thrifty with the money he made at the poultry plant, he always made sure that a proper tithe was given back to the Lord.Many of us who encounter people like Rickey won’t take the time to learn their extraordinary life stories. We give them cursory hellos and then we’re on our way to Wal-Mart or the ball field. We take a quick glance at their life and adjudge their pitiable existence, their limitations, their abnormalities, the unfortunate fall of cards by a divine legerdemain. Many of us have spent a lifetime being trained to feel sorry for people with disabilities. Some of us have even made fun of people who couldn’t help the way God crafted them. I am ashamed to say that I am guilty of such a disgraceful offense. Somewhere along the line, we have convinced ourselves that our lives are “normal,” while people with disabilities live lives that are quite the contrary. All the while we do the sort of things that “normal” humans do.But Rickey. Rickey Baker will never commit a heinous act or do something he sorely regrets. His greatest sin was taking Shep out into the woods to go rabbit hunting. Rickey doesn’t see color of skin, doesn’t want for recognition or money or the fey life. He’ll never put anything into his body that can harm him, and never take anything without asking for it. Perhaps the “normal” people are the ones people should feel sorry for.At the nursing home, Rickey’s favorite song to sing is “I’ll Fly Away.”Some glad morning when this life is o’erI’ll fly away,To a home on God’s celestial shore,I’ll fly away…I’ll fly away Oh GloryI’ll fly away (in the morning)When I die, Hallelujah by and by,I’ll fly awayCan you hear him sing? Can you hear that sweet voice lofting praise to his Maker?I bet Rickey thinks about this song as he sits in his wheelchair in the sunlit lobby of Ridgeview. I bet those verses lap up against the shores of his mind, as a spirit wind blows and comforts him.I do not feel sorry for Rickey Baker. He is at peace. He is happy. He has lived quite a life. An abnormal, extraordinary life.Someday, when Rickey makes it to those celestial shores he’s been singing about for years, when he stands on heaven’s beach and feels its sandy grit through his toes, feels the vivacity of a new, immaculate body, you can bet that he will open his eyes and look out in the distance, where a Crimson Tide will be rolling in. 78