It would be unreasonable to expect noticeable improvement every day. But here we are.

For starters, in a move that would flummox any baby I have ever met, Tanja sat down in and got up from a chair today—a regular, run-of-the-mill chair at that. She had some help, but minimal. Then she pivoted—not a pirouette but more of a three point turn—and sat down on the bed. It was epic.

Then the OT team showed up—this incredibly likable duo of young women who did a kind of Larel and Hardy routine with a heat gun and some thermoplastic, creating a handle form fitted to Tanja’s hand and attachable to any mug or glass she might want to use. No prevarication, no fear of setting up false hopes; they clearly expected her to learn to use it.

“You’re probably tired today,” one of the OTs said, gently. “Next time, we’ll show you some exercises.”

“I’m not that tired,” Tanja said.

She then proceeded to bust out 8 zero-gravity windshield wipers, a set if wrist activations, fist scrunches and individual finger wiggles. On BOTH SIDES! Granted, these are moves you could likely do without even thinking about it. But would grown adults clap their hands and cheer for you as these OT professionals did? It was thrilling: Chariots of Fire writ small.

The effort of all this pushed Tanja’s heart rate from a resting 60 bpm up briefly into the triple digits and reminded me, suddenly, of renowned video fitness instructor Autumn Calabrese.

As Autumn introduces a new “move” and the clock resets to a minute, she will often shout, among other blandishments, “You can do anything for sixty seconds.”

And I, dropping to the ground for stairclimbers or push-ups or burpees or up/downs or hip drops, can’t help but reflect on how demonstrably false that statement is.

But I’ve just realized Autumn is not talking to me. She is speaking to Tanja.

And thirty seconds later, when I am on my knees, sucking air and trying to get my heart back into my chest, I like to look over at Tanja as she rips through a set of whatever Autumn puts in front of her: her lips pursed in a certain way, her nostrils flared, her normally kind eyes fixed and steely.

That’s exactly what she looked like today as she willed her fingers to move. And one after the other, her fingers got the message.