Except for serving a delightful breakfast of French toast and turkey sausage at 8 a.m., the day shift was pretty much hands off. There were other patients coming in and they needed a lot more help than I did. The only time they paid attention to me was shortly after breakfast when the transponder which sent my vitals by radio to the nurse’s station stopped working. Just as the nurse came in to fix it, the aide at the station yelled, “Fourteen is flatline ”
I could see her from my bed and yelled back, “Fourteen is still alive.” I didn’t want the crash team flying into my room.
The nurse told me she always looks at the patient first before believing the monitors. That's a good policy. A breathing patient trumps dead electronics every time.
That was only excitement for the rest of the morning. As I sat waiting for the doctor, the events of the last days settled in. Everything had been lost in the whirlwind of going for a simple stress test, winding up in the hospital, having the blockage found, and walking away from the brink of death. Add to that the futility of trying to convalesce while not being allowed to. It turned me into an emotional wreck.
I found myself laughing hysterically at the absurdity of the night before and crying uncontrollably that I might not have lived to see it. The TV brought no relief, nor did my books so I lay in my bed composing these words in my head. Writing, even mentally, is cathartic to me.
Later in the morning, Brother Brian stopped by to offer communion and prayers of thanks. I accepted both gratefully. I asked if he was on any kind of schedule. When he said he wasn’t, I told him to shut the door and draw the curtain. We continued our conversation of the day before, discussing a wide range of subjects including the priests we both knew and our love of bicycling. It was a joy to talk to someone who just wanted to talk. When I told him about my emotional state, he told me I should write it all down. So you, gentle reader, have him to thank...or blame.
At long last, my cardiologist came in. Never in my life did I ever think I’d have a cardiologist but fate proved me wrong once again. He gave me the all-clear go home but there was still paperwork to process and other stuff to do. I got rid of the hospital gown, got into my street clothes, and sat on my bed to wait.
It’s a good thing they took their sweet time with the dismissal process. Lunchtime brought a baked cod that tasted more of butter than fish. “This can’t be mine,” I thought, but the menu bore my name and it indicated that it was a cardiology patient’s meal. My compliments to LCM’s food service.
It seemed an excruciatingly long time but the porter finally came and I was wheeled out into the bright, beautiful sunshine and air that smelled of life and not antiseptics. Our old Impala never looked so good, Judy never looked so beautiful, and even 95th Street seemed to present an aura of cheerfulness that wasn’t there two days before. It might have been the drugs, lack of sleep, or diminished quantity of blood in my body. Or it could have been the knowledge that I might not have lived to see this day. I felt like I’d been born again. Everything was fresh and beautiful.
It was too far for Judy to take me home and go back to the store so the plan was to go to work with her and leave when she did. My car was in the parking lot but I was under strict orders not to drive. Any sudden movement in my right leg could cause that artery to let go. I didn’t want to bleed to death in my car.
I sat at my desk attempting to do the two day’s worth of Sun-Times crossword puzzles I’d missed but it was hard to concentrate. Instead I looked at Facebook and all the nice things people had written when Colleen posted what had happened. Words cannot express my gratitude for all the prayers and good thoughts that came in from around the world. There were even more when I posted my own message. It good to have friends, especially in times of trouble.
Speaking of Colleen, she was in the neighborhood and stopped by to drive me home. The old saying that there’s no place like home seems trite until you realize that you might never have seen home again. There’s also nothing like your own your own shower. That’s where I painfully pulled off the last ten EKG leads and removed all that sticky crap from my chest and sides. That’s also where I found out definitely that it was a Brazilian. And finally, there’s absolutely no place like your own bed, especially when there are no smokestacks, sirens, beeping monitors, or people touching you all night, unless you want them to.
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