A leg up

I have taken a lot of flights in the last couple weeks while on vacation. Doing so has given me an opportunity that I didn't realize I had until I started this multi-destination journey.

As you may or may not know, I have a long and troubled history with my left leg. It has been shorter and smaller than my right leg since I was born. When I was a kid, I underwent a leg lengthening surgery to balance it out. It was a long process that left scars on my leg that remain visible to this day.

While in recovery from that operation, I managed to break that same leg in a different place, extending the number of months I was confined to wheel chairs and crutches even longer.

All of that happened when I was a kid, but when it was done I was, more or less, a normal youth that grew up into a normal adult. And, like all adults eventually, I learned I hard lesson about what you can and can't do once you turn 30. Specifically, I jumped from a high place and, as a result, broke my knee. My left knee, of course.

Suffice it to say, my left leg is a problem. More than I even realized.

Some years back I was making my annual pilgrimage to San Diego, making my way through airport security. I took my shoes off, placed all my possessions in the tray to run through the x-ray, and stepped inside the scanning machine to get what I hope is a non-problematic amount of radiation beamed through me. All normal airport things.

Upon exiting the machine, one of the TSA agents asked me to stop. He then kneeled down and grabbed my left leg for a pat down.

This caused a strong reaction in me, much more so than I would have anticipated. I pulled my leg away and tried to restrain my fight or flight instincts well enough to negotiate my way through security without getting arrested. Even then, I was surprised that the act of grabbing my leg was enough to put me into a low level anxiety attack.

It makes a bit of sense in retrospect. I have spent the bulk of my life being extra protective of that particular limb. Even today, nearly 30 years later, I can feel the pins that penetrated my leg and foot to hold that broken bone in place as it regrew. Being additionally cautious about it is an automated response to me, as natural as breathing.

So, having learned something about my own psyche that day, I began taking precautionary measures when taking future flights. Namely, I'd wear shorts.

I rarely wear shorts. As part of the subconscious measures I take to protect my leg, I avoid exposing it whenever possible. It's for the same reason I also prefer socks that can nearly reach my knee.

But if wearing shorts in the airport makes it easier to prove that I'm not hiding a bomb in my shin, it's a worthwhile tradeoff.

Yet, it keeps happening. Even wearing shorts, security is overly interested in my left leg and I've had to make a habit of warning them ahead of time that the leg is sensitive and they need to either warn me before grabbing it or find some other way to satisfy themselves.

I'm ashamed to admit it, but it was only on this series of flights that it dawned on me to ask what exactly it was about my leg that was so interesting to them. Clearly it had something to do with the unique nature of my leg, but I'd never thought about what specifically about it was setting off warnings. It's not like my surgeries left any metal in there.

Leaving the San Diego Airport, I asked the security guard fondling my removed sock what was so worrisome about my leg that it needed to be pat down every time I walked through. He told me he knew the reason, but couldn't tell me.

Oh really?

Now I don't just have a question. I have a mystery.

Fortunately, I'm taking a lot of flights on this vacation. A few days after leaving San Diego, I went through airport security again in Sacramento. This time the line was backed up and they were rushing people through. I got through the scanner and was preparing to question the security guy on what I presumed would be the inevitable attempt at a pat down. Instead though, he told me to step back inside and stand flat footed in the machine.

The problem is, I can't really do that. In fact, with the way that I've had to walk for all my life, my heels rarely ever touch the ground. Between the length difference and the lack of mobility in my left ankle, there's really no way I can stand flat footed without contorting my body into an awkward position. By default, I walk and stand on the balls of my feet, with my left at a higher angle to compensate for the imbalance in length.

Fortunately, a second security guard looked at my leg and came to the same conclusion. This marks the very first time a TSA Agent has observed the scars, the size difference, and the way I walk when not wearing my lift and realized that there's something wrong with my leg.

So while I didn't get a chance to inquire about the specific nature, I did get through security without incident and I walked away with a clue. Without realizing it, the TSA Agent in Sacramento explained what the one in San Diego wouldn't. It was the way I stand in the machine that bothers them.

The question now is, what do I do about it?

My next flight home is rapidly approaching. I think I'll try forcing myself to stand flat footed, regardless of what it does to the rest of my posture. I'm curious to see if that makes the difference.

Travis Fischer is a news writer for Mid-America Publishing and remembers when you could just walk through an x-ray machine and be good.