The sky bore a touch of gray as I peered out the cabin’s kitchen window. I stood at the sink, washing vegetables. There was David, down by the lake where we’d docked our rental fishing boat. Family members were with him.
A good thing. Even grasping his cane, he didn’t look too steady. In fact, he sort of listed to starboard. Literally. Four months had passed since he’d had his failed knee replacement surgically evicted and new hardware installed. The healing process advanced with snail feet.
David swung his leg into our boat. Nobody steadied the craft against the dock for him. What was he doing? That was right up there with climbing a ladder while using a chain saw. Didn’t he want to survive until our 50th anniversary? We had nine more years to go. The space between the boat and the dock inched wider. Lord have mercy! He was either going to fall into the drink or split up the middle like some dried-out wishbone yanked apart.
By some miracle, nothing bad occurred.
In November, the day the OryCon Science Fiction/Fantasy Convention opened, my brain revisited that Odell Lake scene. David had just been admitted to Good Samaritan Hospital in Portland. His problem—which had manifested itself as a gradual increase in heart and respiratory rates, had culminated with a combination of congestive heart failure and pneumonia. The damn fluid in his lungs kept him from getting a decent breath. He was drowning on land and coming way too close to going down for the third time.
By some miracle, he recovered.
There’s lots of things we joke about lately. How the salty Rueben Sandwich he ate the day before hospitalization proved his downfall. How, in the future, we’re switching to refundable airline tickets and traveling only where we have doctor friends or relatives. (The presence of our son Dave and his wife, Kathy, in Portland saved the day.) But the truth is, hind-sight isn’t foresight. Neither David’s primary care physician nor his cardiologist picked up the category 5 level of his brewing medical hurricane, any better than we did.
Well I’ve now got the lowdown on really keeping his water retention down low. God’s given me the love of my life back. David and I aim to celebrate that big 50 in nine years.
Merry Christmas! May good health & happiness be yours.
With love,
Laurel & David
