Bronze

The wedding anniversary specialists tell me that the eighth is bronze. Since I’m a geezer, I’m way past that one. But today marks eight years since the day I spent 10 ½ hours on the operating table at Columbia Presbyterian under the skillful scalpel of Dr. Paul McCormick, neurosurgeon to the stars. He got all of that ten inch spinal cord tumor. I think my readers are well aware of my medical history, except that one in Sweden (Hello Annie!). In fact, most of my readers were critical members of my recovery team.

That was quite an eventful time and some of those memories have come back to me today. They wheeled me from post-op to my room in the evening and I guess I was expecting the same type of treatment I got in my hometown hospital after my first surgery, where they wiped every sniffle and often asked me how I was doing. I was in for rude awakening. I was at CP for the surgery, not the aftercare. As the evening progressed, I came to realize this and voiced my concerns, eventually very loudly. My wife was in the residential unit on another floor and I asked them repeatedly to get her. My mouth felt like a desert that someone had been stomping through recently and I couldn’t get a drink. After being ignored for a while, I started screaming for about half an hour. They got my wife.

I felt a little bit of remorse the next day, but only for my wife. And of course the poor bastard who was my roommate. The night shift could go to hell. My wife was stuck with me but roomie got out that day. Now I was the poor bastard in the room. My new cohabitant was fresh off the streets and had a sidekick from the security department with him. He may have been handcuffed to the bed as well, but I wasn’t up and around much so I’m not sure. He did pay me a visit once during meal time. I made nice by giving him a couple salt packets he wasn’t supposed to have. What the hell, I wasn’t his doctor.

I think I got one shower that week. My daily exercise was going from the bed to the door and back with a walker. That was good for twenty minutes of cardio. The physical therapy department took an aggressive approach and had me stand up the first day after surgery. Fortunately my buds Dr. Joe and Jimmy The Wig along with my brother-in-law were in the room. My morphine addled memory recalls that first physical therapist as being about 5’6” and 140 pounds. If it wasn’t for my posse, I would have crushed him before I crumpled in a heap on the floor.

After a week at CP, I got a reprieve from the governor. I had a scenic ambulance ride over to the Kessler Institute in West Orange, the same place where Christopher Reeve spent time after his accident. The staff at Kessler was very attentive so no stentorian complaints were necessary. The days there passed slowly. I looked forward to the communal breakfasts, where I met people worse off than me, many permanently confined to wheelchairs. We also had twice daily rehab sessions, 1 ½ hours each. A very skilled and dedicated staff helped me take on the arduous task of learning to walk again.

Kessler took care of every detail of my life the three weeks I spent there, except laundry. I was fortunate that The Wig and his wonderful wife lived close by and visited regularly. And they did my laundry. There was a coin washer on site. I tried maneuvering my wheelchair in there once to wash a load but I recall not being able to reach it. During my time there I also got a visit from The Wolverine. He came down from Boston on a snowy day to spend several hours with me. If memory serves, he trekked through the snow in a pair of purple Converse Hi Tops. He’s one hell of a nice guy, just not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

After a couple weeks there, they removed the 25 or so staples that spanned my neck to the middle of my back. They also began discussing my departure and where I would continue therapy back home. I was treated great but I wanted to get the hell out of there. My wife came back out and we hopped on an insurance company sponsored first class flight to SF. The warm mixed nuts were tasty but I couldn’t take advantage of the free booze at that point. My parents and 4M and his wife were waiting for us at the airport. I got to see my kids for the first time in a month and misted up. Its times like that that reinforces what is really important in this life.

Eight years on, things are much different. Thanks to the medical community and a great personal trainer, I’m in pretty good physical shape. Thanks to my friends and family, especially my wife, I’m in good emotional shape. I’ve had to make a few concessions to my condition, like a hand brake in my car. As I’ve told 4M on several occasions, braking is an important part of driving. In closing, I’m going to have to disagree with Friedrich Nietzsche. My take is that which does not kill you can certainly mess you up pretty good.

Takes on a Plane

It’s been many days since I’ve provided you my take on life, current events etc. The 10 hour flight from London to SF has provided me time to get some ideas down on paper so I could share them with you, thus brightening your day. I had plenty of room to think, seated in business class. I was upgraded due to my status in the blog world. Being taller than the average blogger, I greatly appreciated it.

I spent this past week in the suburbs of Brussels. Before I was corrected by 4M, I may have referred to it as a boondoggle. Now I understand that it was a junket, undertaken so I could work on a corporate boondoggle. We had a three day powwow including some cross-functional, dysfunctional meetings and a brainstorming session. I’ve found that brainstorming does not work well unless the room has a strict 1:1 ratio of bodies to brains.

I did not get into Brussels proper due to a couple evening get togethers, including a team building event at my boss’s house. We prepared our own dinner and it turned out well. The downside was that, after a few glasses of wine, my American sense of humor was met with polite smiles or befuddled stares. For example, someone pointed out an antique rifle near the kitchen. I said it had been used by their Belgian ancestors to hold off the Luxembourgers. I’m just glad I didn’t say Rhode Island could kick their ass in a war. (I stole the RI line from some obscure movie I saw 20 or 30 years ago.)

I see that W is again disappointed in the less than prolific pace of my recent posts. I was going put something out there before my trip, since there had been quite a news cycle, but I didn’t have the time. The story of Anna Nicole Smith’s death has dominated media reports. It was a sad end to a sad life. She would have been much better off continuing to live an anonymous life in her small Texas town, before our freakish culture transmogrified her into a Marilyn Monroe manqué. I also have some compassion for the lady astronaut who took a diapered drive across the Southeast to settle a score. However, she had a lot more going for her than Anna Nicole, who, to the best of my knowledge, never went after a perceived romantic rival with mace, a knife and Maxwell’s Silver Hammer.

There was also the recent news flash that Ted Haggard is now “completely heterosexual” after his conversion in the desert, with the help of some fellow right wing lunatic evangelicals. My question is how can they tell he is “completely heterosexual”? Is there some sort of test? Are there identifying marks, like the heterosexual bar code?

Last week also featured the return of MOC. You may remember her from my post last June. She was in town nailing down a major account for her firm. And make no mistake, it’s her firm. I somehow can’t see her working for someone else. 4M, TK, The Upgrade King and I met her in downtown Palo Alto, The UK’s former stomping grounds. The UK has jettisoned his most recent start-up so he can be a ski bum for the rest of the season. Our meal at Lavanda started with several small plates. We approached the menu in a very logical fashion. Instead of choosing a few we liked, we eliminated three and then ordered the rest. 4M ordered a Sancerre (Sauvignon Blanc from the Loire Valley). I had to check in with him recently to confirm which wine we started with because I didn’t want to say “we had a white from the refrigerator”. 4M also brought a 1997 Arrowood Cabernet Sauvignon, Reserve Speciale, which we had with the main course. That wine was outstanding and everyone enjoyed their entree. Quality and quantity were both well represented. I recommend it.

http://www.lavandarestaurant.com/

MOC shared with us that she thought she might be a good candidate for the Dove soap ads featured here:

http://www.doveproage.com/?source=dove_a

I, for one, embrace middle age but I was little disturbed by the fact that no men were included in the ad. I plan to submit this photo of me to Dove for their next ad campaign.