Do-over

   If I were ever to get another cat, which seems highly unlikely, I would get a cat with the shortest hair possible. We have owned 4 cats in 45 years, well 5 if you count Tiger, who we had only a few months  before  he escaped the house and became a highway casualty.  And, oh, there was the black cat that Ma gave us when we first moved into this house.  We never named that cat, it preferred Dave, hiding out somewhere all day, and only appearing when he got home from work.  That cat  was an indoor-outdoor cat before it was road killed  after only a year or so.  But the 4 later cats, which we kept indoors at all times, were all long haired:  Roger, Nike, Napster and Maybe, our present cat.   Maybe, being half Persian and half Maine Coon,  has the longest, thickest, and therefore most matted coat of all the cats, and the next-to-worst disposition, second only to Nike, who was a full  Maine Coon with a scary nature.  Maybe's hairballs and dingleberries are becoming more problematic  over the years, as she gains years and loses tolerance for being groomed.  We have learned that taking  a cat to the vet's for hygiene-associated  grooming  problems is a costly venture indeed.  I blame Dave for the problems because he overfeeds her: she is so overweight she can't reach all of her body, so that's when the hygiene problems develop.  At least that's the theory I'm working from.  I googled and found that PetSmart will bathe long-haired cats for only $35, so maybe that will help.  Her birthday is June 9,  I think in the year 2004, though possibly 2005.  So with her age and my age, I probably will not be in the market for a shorthair, though you never know, do you?

Holy Crepitus

     Today was Annual Spider Plant Resuscitation Day.  That means bringing the spider plants from the basement where they have spent the winter to the front of the house where they spend the summer suspended from the branches of the evergreen trees.  They look like released prisoners, yellow, scrawny and thin and half dead.  I snip off all the dead parts, which is about half of the plant.  The plants never die; they are revived in time to go on with their lives.  One plant started it all; I must have  had about 50 or 60 of them over the years.  My goal is to hold at 4 plants; they're said to help in purifying the air, and while I don't have room for them in the house, I figure it can't hurt to have cleaner air in the basement.  They reproduce like crazy; each plant puts forth a number of  babies, and when I transfer them from cellar to the great outdoors, the shoots break off, and each is ready to grow into a new plant.  Over the years,  I have given many away--to the Democratic Committee fundraiser, to the Valley Falls Library and to friends and relatives.  I have to wait until fall to do so though, because that's when the plants look green and healthy, unlike their puny condition now.
     Last fall, I gave a number away, 6 plants I believe, and kept only 4 of the original plants, including one which Greg entered in the Schaghticoke Fair and won a First Place Ribbon and $5.00.  I think I have 7 or 8 plants now; those little broken suckers thrived and grew.  I used to transport 2 plants at a time from downstairs to out front, but last year carried only 1 at a time.  This year I asked Dave to do it.  I just trimmed them and hung them from the trees.  Next year, who knows?  Crepitus, crepitus. 
   

Floss

  I understand dental floss was invented in the late 1800's, but I don't think I ever heard of it until at least the 1950's.  I knew of Mary Ann Evan's novel, "The Mill on the Floss," where Floss was the name of the river, but I never made the connection that perhaps the river was so named because it wound like a silky thread, or floss.  My aunt had a dog named Flossie long ago, maybe because its coat was silky.  Who knows?
   It seems strange now, but back in the days of my childhood, it was rare for anyone to receive any kind of dental care, and especially not of the prophylactic sort.  I think that may have been different in the city, but in rural areas, there were few if any dentists, and the father of the family  worked full time; there was little thought to dental care, except in cases of painful toothache, and even then home remedies were the order of the day.  Most adults of all economic straits were resigned to wearing dentures as they got older.  Children were fortunate if their teeth came in straight  and if they were not overly prone to decay, especially as involving the front teeth.
My first dental visit was at about age 11, because of a severe toothache in a molar;  my father drove me to a dentist in Schaghticoke who had hours on Saturday.  He was an elderly dentist and he allowed his pet green parakeet to sit on his shoulder while he inspected your mouth.  He tried to pull my tooth, struggled, broke off the tooth at the roots and said I had soft teeth, and when I got older and the tooth hardened, the extraction would probably be easier.  My father ended up later driving me to another dentist in Mechanicville, who was horrified, but must have helped in some way I can't remember.
    Back to flossing:  While my mother always had us brush our teeth when we were little, I don't think we had dental floss in our house until probably the 1960's, when it was beginning to be promoted.  I used to floss occasionally, then regularly, and now I must say I floss at least 5 or 6 times a day.  With the availability of Floss Picks, I can't understand why anyone would use the spool variety;  that takes 2 hands, a lot of grimacing and, Heaven help us, the expulsion of a certain amount of debris into the atmosphere, or onto  the bathroom mirror.  A floss pick requires only one hand, a mostly closed mouth, and no outwardly expelled effluvia.  The cost is only about $3.00 for a hundred.  Well worth it, say I.
    

Da Vinci and Me

    Leonardo DaVinci, not in complete accord with the Catholic religion, was charged as a heretic, and in line for some pretty nasty treatment if he did not confess to being otherwise.  Taking the word of a trivia master, I'm led to understand that Leonardo denied being an atheist (if that's possible),  when confronted with the instruments that would be used to torture him. 
     My beliefs may have grown somewhat tepid, and I am not famous enough for any religion to be interested in claiming my genius, and furthermore, I have committed no acts of heresy, so torturing me would gain nothing for anyone.  Nevertheless, I share with Leonardo the experience of impending torture. I don't know what instruments of torture they waved in front of him, but I know what would be effective in having me confess to anything.   While I was awaiting  what was purported to be relief from pain, a tray of menacing-looking instruments was positioned right in front of my face.  Not to the side, nor above, where it would be out of my line of sight, but at eye level, just inches away.  I could clearly see among the array the sturdy handles of at least  half a dozen large tools, which resembled those found in my father's old toolbox.  They were graduated in size, so if one didn't do the job, on to the next, and the next....shouldn't there be some realization of possible effects?  The torture maven commented if it was a bothersome sight to just close my eyes.  Too late--the image is forever emblazoned on my brain. 

Way Back When

Don was coming out of the Massachusetts Avenue apartment he shared with his brother when we pulled into the driveway.  He was carrying in both arms a large cardboard carton filled with some kind of stuff.  When he saw us, he smiled and  immediately lifted his arm to wave, letting the carton fall to the ground, where its contents spilled all over the driveway.  I thought he had a great sense of humor.    "Ain't it funny how time slips away?"     

C'est moi.

"Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead"     Bring on the juice.

Shelter-in-Place

   That's exactly what I've been doing for some time now.  I haven't heard any all-clear yet. 

A Pencil---For Your Thoughts.

   In order to cover all bases in getting a clean bill of health, I needed a  dermatology check, since I'd had a small but potentially seious lesion several years ago. My dermatologist had recently retired, and except for  one  follow-up visit with another best described as draconian, I needed to find a new dermatologist.  I googled and found a local doctor who was accepting new patients, and made an appointment to have the iffy spot examined.  That dermatologist  is what I would term a society doctor, though that might be a  little extreme. However, he does appear on TV with his son  in TV commercials to advertise their  practice, and his office is rather glitzy; there is a spa associated with it, and all types of skin care and beauty options. He was courteous and professional, took a biopsy which he advised was most likely a minor ketosis, which he later confirmed.   No problem.
     But one thing struck me as odd for  an office so well appointed, with a clientele of upscale parents having the latest treatments for their teenagers' acne.   When I went to the sign-in desk to fill out the paperwork, I was handed the usual clipboard, but with it a yellow pencil.  Of all the forms I've ever filled out, at a plethora of medical and hospital desks, I have never before been handed a pencil.  Now I usually try to remember to use my own pen to fill out the forms (germs, you know), but this time I thought maybe they preferred pencil for some reason.  So I started with the pencil but soon gave up and reverted to my ballpoint.  Pencil is hard to read, and the paper didn't take well to pencil scratches anyway.  I returned the clipboard to the window and saw the receptacle for the return of the pencils,  a cup containing a number of the yellow pencils, reminiscent of what is  used by street performers to avoid being classified as beggars.  And----a notice above the container of pencils advising patients, or clients, to please return the pencils to the designated container.  Cutting costs where you can may be the way to do business------but pencils!

At the End

The man was dying: there was no doubt about it.  Even he, who had been denying his symptoms, and then his diagnosis, could no longer escape the truth.  He had not drawn up a will, though he had considerable  holdings, and  in more than one country.  He'd been married, fathered several children, then divorced and remarried.  So his estate was destined to be complicated, to say the least.  Several members of his family traveled to his sickbed, trying to prevail upon him to settle his affairs while he still could. He would not comply, and subsequently died not long after.  The consensus was that he was a cruel and heartless man, who would not take the time to facilitate matters for his heirs.  That may  have been a true statement, but to look at it in another light, a human being, faced with imminent death, may well be so immersed in the process of having to face death that there  is no room for anything else. 
    We are groomed by today's society as to the necessity of looking beyond our own lifespan to put our affairs in order, to insure that those left behind can smoothly, and with as little taxation liability as possible, assume the potential burden of what is left after we are gone.  In older times, what was left was mainly property, the family homestead, which would usually continue to be inhabited by whatever family members wished to live there.  Unless you were royalty, most people didn't rely on written wills to divvy up the remnants of a life.  For sure, there were probably many family arguments as to who got what, but the point is the dying person did not have to bear the onus of guilt for not smoothing the path to inheritance. With the increase of discretionary income, and the prevalence of Social Security, there are many senior citizens, so I'm told, who never touch their Social Security benefits, but keep them in reserve for their grandchildren.  It's considered almost a duty for a person who statistically has not much time left on earth to make sure there is an unobstructed flow of assets to another generation or two.  Moreover, to make it even easier, seniors are encouraged to plan their funeral arrangements and of course to pay for them if possible.  To do any less is negligent and thoughtless behavior.  Many accept this as comforting and in accord with what they want to do, but these plans are made when the person is still amongst the living.  
      The knowledge you are destined to not live much longer, in terms of statistical probability, is much different from being engaged in the active process of dying.  No matter how generous, loving and caring a person may be in giving of self to others, there comes a point when all  thoughts turn inward;   that occurs when our modern and magnificent medical system relays the news that there is nothing more to be done.  You will die, are indeed dying now.
    Consider the instance of the man cited above.  He was a father, a husband, a holder of various other titles accorded to the life he lived.  But above all, and truest to his very self, he has always been alive--up to the last breath drawn.  Having to face the journey into what can not even be imagined must take precedence over all else.  The prospect of death, even more troubling, the state of not living any more, is exponentially much more  overwhelming than anything you can possibly do to  affect the fortunes of those who are still living.  From the day you drew your first breath until the time you draw your last, you belong to the giant membership of the living.  When you leave that club, you are forced to abandon all contact, and it seems likely that you no longer care about anything at all on this earth.  When the family approached the man on his deathbed, with pleas for helping them expedite his wishes, his refusal may not have been out of anger and meanness;  it could be possible that he had absolutely no interest in dealing with material things.  
The comfort of a settled estate promised to us by funeral directors and attorneys has no bearing after a person's attention is directed elsewhere.   Living heirs-to-be may blithely and gradually  accept the loss of their forbears as an inevitability, (which it is):   the dying have a briefer time to accept  their loss, which is everything and everybody mortal.
  

Solipsism

Is it solipsism or is it just me?

Streetcar

  I read today that the San Francisco streetcars cost the city millions in insurance payoffs due to injuries, and hold the record as the form of travel with the  most accidents.  I rode those streetcars some years ago when we were guest visitors at Stanford University.  Travel by streetcar was interesting and enjoyable and seemed safe enough for those of us inside the car, but where the danger seemed to lie was with those who hung on to the outside of the cars, which some passengers chose to do.   There was a small fee to ride, but that didn't apply to the young boys who just jumped on the outside platform, rode a block or two and hopped off at the next corner.  I winced at the sight, though I didn't see any of them fall to their deaths.  An added attraction was the entertainment at the ends of the streetcar runs:  the musicians who never quite made it, eerily reminiscent of the music of Willie Nelson or, later, Crystal Bowersox.

Running the TKR Gauntlet

   What doesn't kill you, well, can contribute to your being closer to death.  The course so far includes being nearly microwaved by an errant machine, a case of hyponatremia from an over-zealous regimen, and a routine dental cleaning morphing into a traumatic nightmare (I'm not exaggerating).  Help me, Obi-Wan. 

Looking Back----

   When I was in high school and prospects for attending any kind of college looked bleak indeed, because of financial constraints, there was one teacher who tried to help me find a way to continue my education.  He was my English teacher for 11th and 12th grades, and new to HVC in that first year, 1954-55.  He was young for one of our teachers, 28 years old, I think, and different from most of the old-timers in that he introduced us to sarcasm.  That first year, a number of students transferred out of his class, into Mrs. Hack's, because they were disturbed by his attitude, but, though I would never have acknowledged it at the time, I enjoyed what was then condsidered a somewhat edgy approach to the classroom.  English class was where I felt most secure, and the only high school class where I ever ventured an opinion.  I grew to enjoy the give and take of differences of opinion in discussions of literature, and did very well in the class, including the all-important English 11 Regents exam.  Mr. A. also conducted classes, an innovation at the time, attempting to prepare us for the New York State Scholarship Examination, as well as practice for College Entrance Exams which were then required of all college hopefuls.  I remember he asked me to stay after class one afternoon to tell me of the possibilities of "night school" which was then the only alternative if college expenses were out of reach.  Things were so different then.  I was flattered that he didn't want me to waste what he considered my intellectual talents, but even the thought of something called night school was overwhelming:  how the heck could I possibly get there?  My father was nearing retirement, he drove an unreliable old klunker of a car, and I was still years away from getting a driver's license.  As it turned out, both my sister and I won the prized and  rare at the time NYS Regents Scholarships, as had our brother the preceding year, so we were able to attend the tuition-free State University, but that's a tale for another time.
    The  English teacher who had endeavored to help me ended up marrying another teacher at the school and moving back to New York, where he became a Guidance Teacher, following his instincts as with my future, I guess.   I last spoke to him at one of our class reunions which he returned to attend with his wife.  He told me they had one little boy, named after him by reversal of his first and middle names, and who was enrolled in Catholic School.   That teacher is dead now, though his wife is still alive.  Both of them were good and decent people so there is no reason or justification for the terrible tragedy that befell them.  In 1987, their only child was sentenced to life in prison for a horrendous crime, one destined to be noted forever in the registry of such crimes.  Some things just should not happen.
    

MA(u)D(lin) MEN

Now that the show is back on Sunday nights,  it should be no surprise if the suicide rate escalates on Monday mornings.  The show's atmosphere reminds me of all those essay papers I had to write as a college English major.  By the time I finished writing at 4:00 A.M., my deep and introspective themes would have evaporated into the morning dawn, leaving me in the dark as to what point I had been  trying to make.  Oh, the horror!

Self-fulfilling Prophecy

Yesterday I developed a throbbing toothache, which last night transformed itself into pure misery.  I managed to wait until this morning to call the dentist; he prescribed antibiotics and pain medicine.  Today, there is a train track coursing between my upper teeth and my gums, the kind with the hand car  propelled by gandy dancers.  As soon as the car gets to the front center of my mouth, it reverses and swings back to its starting point, in the manner of a pendulum.  The dentist seemed to have been caught a little off guard, and he prescribed the strongest doses of medicines he could.  I've  seldom taken anything but aspirin and Tylenol, but I'm into it now, trying to head off the runaway train.   

Squeamish

    A few seasons ago,  and probably for only one season, there was a hospital centered medical show that depicted actual real-time medical events and procedures.  Not that pathetic  and corny TV show that stages re-enactments of outlandish situations, but a show with real -life doctors  dealing with actual traumas.  Patients underwent emergency surgeries due to illness or accidents, and the cameras ran throughout.  Sometimes the patients did not survive.   I assume the patients or their families must have authorized the filming and telecasting.  I remember watching incredibly graphic scenes of complex and brutally realistic medical interventions and procedures that would put Kevin Ware's merely broken leg to shame.  The point is I was able to reach a point of detachment that made it possible for me to view the gore and the tragedy.   Except for one time, when a woman had reached into the glove compartment of her car where she had stashed a loaded pistol, and the gun discharged, maiming several of her fingers.  I had to quickly change the channel before I could see how the surgeons tried to put her hand and fingers back together.  Reconstructing aortas, intestines, even brains were all viewable, but not the fingers.  I get shivers just thinking about it.
       In similar fashion, as each subject is brought to mind or is potentially  applicable in my personal or family life, I view internet videos of medical procedures and conditions.  For example, I have viewed videos, many in real time, of complete cataract surgeries (the taco fold is way cool), corneal transplants (in Fuchs' Dystrophy patients), colonosopies (both virtual and the real thing), ureteroscopy and lithotripsy (for kidney stones), and total knee replacement (most gruesome).   This week my dentist referred me to a periodontist, where he said I would be presented with  several tooth salvaging options, one of which would involve "crown lengthening."  The term was new to me, so when I got home I hied myself to the computer to learn all about it. Reading about it was bad enough, but when I got to the video where "the flap" was lifted, I couldn't press escape fast enough.   I still have those shivers running up and down my legs.  Save me from my teeth.

Tooth be tolled

I just counted my teeth.  If I counted  right, I have 27.  That doesn't seem right. 

"I just work here..."

  We were waiting the other day, about 3 or 4 of us, for routine bloodwork and lab tests.  A woman walked in, rather briskly, and approached the desk. She had blonde hair and was wearing a white ski jacket.  "Sign in, "  said the nurse on duty, "on this board."   The woman declined the offered sign-in board.  "No," she said, "I'm  here to file a complaint."   "This is just a lab; you'll need to complain to the hospital office," said the nurse.  Very well, was the reply and the white coated woman left.   But in a few minutes she returned, wanting to retrieve the telephone number, which she was given and she left once more.  Now I'm all in favor of keeping services up to par, but it was an awkward moment for all of us who were waiting.  After all, we who were waiting were trusting that we were going to get what we came for; who wants to be reminded of errors or bad service.  The woman was composed and polite.  Who knows what her complaint was:   lost test results, incorrect information, a prolonged wait, a snippy person answering the phone, could be anything. maybe justified, maybe frivolous.  But I for one resented her behavior.   This lab is conveniently located in a modern office building, meaning I don't need to enter a dreaded hospital building, and there's plenty of parking.  This lab is staffed, as far as my experience has been, by nurses who are skilled in drawing blood, unlike the distracted yahoos who you find in the hospital labs.  I felt like telling that woman  to go complain about something  else, and leave this lab alone.  Besides, who walks into a place to file a complaint: isn't that what email is for?

Shades of Gray

  I'm in the process of cleaning out my closet.  I first disposed of all my pants, Whale Gray in color.  Geez, I should have sued. 

A World Divided

                TO HAVE AND  HAVE NOT--PART 1
    Some years ago,  I lost my pocketbook while I was shopping at Colonie Center.  I'd bought several large items, like pillows and shoes which were in shopping bags, and I inadvertently failed to pick up my purse when I'd put all the bags down to look at another item.  I retraced my steps to the last place I knew I'd had my purse with me, but it was gone.  Unlike men, who typically stash their valuables throughout several pockets, women place all their belongings in a single container, and when separated from that, the world ends as far as communication is concerned----wallet, change for payphone, then a main resource, car keys----all are gone.  I felt so cut off from the world.  I found my way to the Mall Security Office to see if my bag had been turned in, and to use the phone to call my husband who was at work several miles away.  The security officer was on his way to a dentist's appointment, so he told me, and was of limited help,  but I did manage to use the courtesy phone to call Dave to come rescue me.  I sat on a bench in the mall waiting for him to come, feeling exposed and bereft.  I envied every woman walking by, each carrying a handbag.  The world was divided in two:  those who were successfully connected to their lives and those who were cut off from any meaningful existence, in this case me, a minority of one.  (The wait was much longer than I had expected, so I was afraid I'd given Dave the wrong contact information; what if he thought I was at another mall, or if he expected me to be waiting outside. I had no way to let him know: even the security office was now closed.  Eventually he showed up; as it turned out, while I was waiting in misery, he, in the comfort of his office, had taken the time to cancel my credit cards.  If I hadn't needed a ride home, I would have killed him.  Moreover, as we were leaving the mall, I was paged over the loudspeaker.  Someone had turned in my pocketbook, with all contents  completely intact.   Good news, though I did have to re-activate all my credit cards.
                                     PART 11
 Our dog had died, our third collie, and the most appealing of the three great dogs we had owned.  We'd replaced our first, Chance, with Lex, after a year had passed, and then Cosmo replaced Lex, also a year after we'd lost him.  When Cosmo died, we knew he would be our last dog, primarily because he was so much a part of the family he would be  irreplaceable, and also because we lived on the main highway so finding a location to  exercise a dog was time and energy consuming. Time does move us on.  Once more, the world was divided into two parts---dog owners, and those who did not have a dog.  Whereas before, I envied every woman who was one with her purse, the pang of not having a dog went much deeper and lasted for a longer period of time, actually right up to the present. 
      
                                 PART NEXT
   I wonder about other losses that occur over time, losses more critical to one's essential  being than a lost purse or a lost pet.  As we age, we inevitably lose what we once had;  vim, vigor, resiliency, physical strength.  We mourn the passings, but if we're lucky, such deteriorations are gradual and universal, and don't separate us from our peers.  Major mishaps and serious diseases leave us vulnerable, but mostly without much choice as to what path to take to get the best results.  But what about voluntary separations from the self we once were.   I'm trying to determine if opting for an artificial body part, such as knee replacement, would make me feel as if the world were divided into two parts--those with and without artificial joints.  I've sat in a mall and observed the handbag carriers stride confidently by; I've checked out in a supermarket behind smug dog owners pushing carts laden with giant bags of dogfood.   It's hard to predict how I'll  feel about yet another degree of separation.
   

Break Time

"Now that you're here, do you mind if I take my break now?"  These are not the words of a fast food worker, but rather words spoken by one member to another of the nursing staff  involved in the care of a hospital  patient who was being prepared for a medical  procedure.  Workplace breaks are essential and indeed mandated by law, but it would seem appropriate if the scheduling of breaks was pre-arranged, or at very least done out of earshot of the patient.   No patient wants or  expects a lasting relationship with a hospital care employee, but it would be much more reassuring if the person tending to your needs,especially prior to your being administered anesthesia, seemed to be paying attention to what was going on in the room, not contemplating an escape from it. 
    A study was conducted a number of years ago assessing the number of hours worked by  medical students training to become doctors.  The consensus was that the long shifts were responsible for extreme fatigue, and that exhaustion may well have been responsible for the occurrence of medical errors.  As a result of the study's findings, the mandated number of hours was reduced.  A new study based on the shortened shift worked by the doctors was recently released.  This follow-up study showed that the number of medical errors did not decrease when the shifts were shorter, but in actuality increased.  The conclusion being drawn is that shorter shifts mean more frequent handoffs of patients from  doctor to doctor and that means more room for error.  Less individual commitment equates with less responsibility; "I was only here for a short time."
   A patient is admitted to a hospital  room.   A white-board on the wall in front of the patient's bed is the sign-in area for whatever personnel will be taking care of the  patient that day.  There may be a half dozen or more names in the course of the day, the names being erased as those staff members  fulfill their duties.  The idea is to help the patient keep track of who their caretakers are; in effect, the patient knows that Amy or Ann, or Ali was here, but with one swipe of an eraser has disappeared without  a trace. 

Word is....

On Entertainment Tonight,  Rocsi Diaz reported that Kevin Ware's broken leg left him "withering in pain."  Sounds like that would be a rather gradual process, doesn't it?