Cyndi Segroves of Tucson, Ariz., and her friend, Reg Roy, visit the Great Wall of China.

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by Andy Vladimir

Ten years ago, in 1997, I stopped walking and started using a three-wheeled Amigo scooter. My myotonic muscular dystrophy had finally done me in (or so I thought).

Before that, I’d circled the globe. I’d been up the Swiss Alps and down the Grand Canyon. I’d walked the back streets of Bangkok and Unter den Linden, the main street of Berlin.

But now I was sunk. I couldn’t go anywhere, and my days as a travel maven were over.

Lord knows, I tried. But my frustrations started as soon as I arrived at an airport. At every airport I was told to go to the main luggage check-in counter, where I was then instructed to wait until a wheelchair could be obtained. Against my wishes I was then transferred into the airport’s chair.

My scooter disappeared, and if I was lucky I would find it in one piece with my other luggage at my destination. Meanwhile, I was wheeled down to the gate where I was transferred to another wheelchair to board the plane.

You know the story. Like me, some of you, I’m sure, have been left abandoned in empty airport concourses, had your chair or scooter broken (with no offer to help pay for repairs), or been treated like a piece of baggage yourself, instead of a real live, breathing person.

But that was then …

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It’s safe to say that for the most part those days are over. The airlines have gotten their act together.

“Now they know we’re out there,” said Steve Mydanick, direc-

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2007, No. 1