Designer, writer, activist, muse, bodhisattva.
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Heat Is But An Intensity
She asked me about my journal, thinking two weeks ago was but yesterday.
“How have you enjoyed writing in the third person?”
“Quite well,” I replied. I smiled as I held her cold hand, looking at her laying in the hospital bed with tubes in her nose and bandaged cotton on her forearms.
She doesn’t want people to see her like this, to not have control and be left to the mercy of painkillers releasing their prescribed dosage into her bloodstream. The surgery was Tuesday, a 2½-hour procedure that’s left her with titanium rods in her vertebrae, close to the cocyx. A part of her hip bone was used to succesfully graft the rods to her spine, and this degenerative injury has reached its conclusion. She will be well, and she will have control of her life again.
But for now, she is laying in a hospital bed with tubes in her nose and scars from the plastic tape that was pulled hurriedly from her cheek by the medical staff. She was given morphine to help ease the pain after her surgery, only nobody bothered to check that the painkiller was going into her vein. Thank goodness for the determination of her night nurse who investigated the situation and brought in an IV specialist to correct this painful mishap. And she was taken off the morphine and given prescription painkillers to ingest, but they do not come quickly enough to ease her pain. She hasn’t slept in over a month, and even now she cannot rest for more than 30 minutes without feeling the physical aftermath of the surgery and the mental anguish of the two car accidents that brought her here.
She knows that I can visit and not be shocked or horrified by what I see, that I have done this before, that I can understand. She asked me if my sister had the same situation, if this was déjà vu for me. I told her that my sister was in the ICU unit for three months after she was hit by the car, and that my first memory of seeing her fragile body in the bed was the jaundice skin and gravel still embedded into her flesh. My sister went in and out of a comatose state a total of three times, then transferred to a hospital room of her own where my mother and grandmother stood constant vigil until she awoke, laughing, from the song I whispered into her ear.
Her hands are incredibly cold, and I do my best to keep her right one warm in mine. She asked me if I was naturally warm and ran warmer when sleeping at night. I told her that she was correct, and she smiled with a story about a friend of ours who can’t sleep next to someone at night because it’s too much heat. I continued to hold her hand, mentioning how I was told that warm hands are indicative of a healer. She smiled and said that I am indeed a healer, that she has always known this, and that I will heal many.
I poured her more ice water for her dry throat. I walked down the hallway to fill her cup with more ice chips. I brought her a mix CD of music to help her relax and enjoy whatever time will be spent in this hospital room. I continued to hold her hand and talk with her after the posted visiting hours.
The painkillers finally took effect and her eyes fell heavy. I smiled and kissed her good-night, telling her that I love her and hope she gets well soon. I drew the blinds in her room, pulled the curtains around her bed, turned off the light above her and turning on another one opposite her curtain, and left her with healing music.
Her hands never grew warm, so I will try again.
Thursday, 2002 November 28