In which he reflects on time spent in the hospital

I have large lungs, but not very good ones.

I went to urgent care last night because I was having trouble breathing. I had battled chest constriction and shallow breathing the night before. It kept me up a little, but I was mostly fine in the morning, and then super-fine in the afternoon, and then sometime in the evening, possibly during the Simpson's Treehouse of Horror, I decided it was pretty serious. I tried walking out to the porch for fresh air; my anxiety and the effort of unlocking the door only made things worse. I scuttled back to the bedroom and kneeled with my head out the window with the curious lack of shyness of the ill. After I calmed a bit and went to say I was having a little trouble breathing, I discovered I could only say a few words at a time, and he said let's hit the hospital.

It took a bit of persuading. I was worried about the expense, of course, and having not even had time to fill out the paperwork for my health insurance, which went into effect just two days prior. And I also felt that, as with snot, this was my personal battle against my body. I agreed to walk toward the hospital, very slowly, knowing the air and distraction might get my mind off the panic of short breath. It did. But I still couldn't see my breathing going back to normal on its own, and I didn't want to have another obnoxious night of trying to breathe. We went first to a drug store on the way; they recommended we go to urgent care. By the time I got to the triage nurse, I felt pretty OK, but I think the plastic clip on my finger told her that my oxygen levels were low.

They moved me gently and quickly to a room and gave me a hookah of oxygen and albuterol and what-have-you. Several nice nurses came in at several times. They asked questions, and I realized again how little grasp we have on the past. What was I doing right before this last attack? God knows. We tried to work through various possibilities. Was there any common instigator between Saturday's mild and Sunday's serious attacks? Was it the flute, and breathing deeper than usual, possibly sucking down allergens that don't do quite as much damage higher up in the lungs? Was it the cats? If so, why now? And why so different tonight?

I half-expected a chest x-ray to reveal an alien pregnancy, but my lungs were simply clear and large—freakishly large, the x-ray technician all but said. He had trouble developing the x-ray film because the machine had two blinking reds. He opened the side of the beast several times to no avail. He went to get another tech, and as soon as the tech entered the room and reached out his hand, the machine whirred and blinked green.

I half-expected the blood test to reveal bird flu, but it was clean. They had to poke in the wrist and pass by tendons to get to the artery. They first tried my right wrist, and I felt nauseous and sweaty and had to lie down. My right wrist was shy, so they tried the left. Then the nurse said, "Let's see if we got enough blood for them to work with." Thankfully that was the end of the wrist stabbings.

I didn't know what to expect from the CT scan (they were looking for "rule out pulmonary embolus"), for which I was asked if I had any shellfish allergies and was then attached to a bag of fish juice (which felt a little like Novocain in the arm and privates). I was slowly inserted into a whirring round machine with an electronic voice that said, "Breathe in and hold your breath." Many long seconds later the voice released me with, "Breathe." In a darkened rectangular glass right in front of me, I could see the IV bag behind me drip-drip.

I was wheeled to Zone 1, which was much like I imagined the TV show "Scrubs" must be. All the nurses were young and energetic and funny. There was a strangely screaming woman from a room at the other end of the hall; before long everyone was mentioning The Exorcist and openly dubbed her Satan. (I should point out that everyone at the hospital was hell-bent on treating patients humanely and respectfully. I marvel at how anyone can be so passionate and dedicated to their work. I am reminded: One patient made me smile with his funny-crazy statements—for example, he hadn't been washing his hair since he had this ear infection, so couldn't braid his hair, so it was growing straight out, and he didn't like it. Where I might have said, "Um, OK, well. Just take this twice a day," the nurse helping him said, "Well, you know the afro's coming back," and the two continued on joking like that for a minute or two.)

Eventually the doctor came and told me that I didn't have a pulmonary embolus but I did have the lungs of a much older person. Never, never smoke again, he said . . . which means both (a) I'll never get to smoke my fabled "celebratory cigarette" (which I thought I deserved after a year of nonsmoking but never took) and (b) I'll never be able to play a smoking character at community theater near you. And he said, with meaningful looks, that I probably shouldn't live with cats. Other than that, he prescribed four steroid pills to decrease swelling and two different inhalers: one for emergencies and one for twice-daily use.

I'd been given two doses of fish juice, so they let me suck up a whole bag of mysterious IV fluid. (I had to pee.) Then a nice nurse, who had been doing sweet battle with a man who insisted that he was better and could in fact walk, came by and showed me how to use an inhaler.

After seven hours, ending at 4 in the morning, we walked home, strangely comfortable burning our second tin of midnight oil. Newscasters from another dimension were on the TV. Before long, we slept.

Needless ramblings

It does little good to write, but it might be fun.

Had a poetry meeting on Sunday. There was much discussion about master's degrees and business, two of my least favorite subjects. I had brought a sucky poem, and I also contributed very little to the discussion because of a growing suspicion of poetry workshops.

There was a poem that began with Adam and Eve and ended with the very important fact that every moment in this beautiful world oscillates between birth and annihilation.

Also a perfect poem that described one of my favorite fairy-tale characters simply and perfectly:

She carries herself
like a ruby.

Had a guest flutist at tonight's rehearsal. Exciting, but also a little frightening, because one never knows when one's new friends might say something that violates one's principles. Or, as tonight, activate one's defense mechanisms, such as when the flutist cautioned that "he really meant the dynamic markings, otherwise it just plods along, you know." Immediately I wanted to cry, "He?!? HE?!? You mean the esteemed editor, or do you think Bach wrote those?" But it went well and was fun, and I somehow passed the sight-reading test again, suggesting that possibly I could make a living at this (except in the presence of the qualified), and we have a new musical friend.

One of my many bosses says, "Yes, I was discussing this with X [another boss], and we were wondering, just what kind of music qualifications does he [that means me] actually have?"

That would be: None.

I'm not supposed to say things like that—things that totter on the edge of vocational criticism. But I've never worked somewhere where I didn't somehow make friends. Today, one coworker greeted me as "Sean." And another said, "What's your name? I see you all the time!" I know both of their names because I have met them and talked to them and they (like me) have name plates outside their cubes/offices. Maybe things will change tomorrow, when I am a regular, non-temporary employee.

But the most important thing is . . . the flute? Which makes no sense at all. Oh, maybe I should write another story.

Tonight the creative life has left me—too angry, too much to blame. When was it sucked out? Why am I not a multimedia artist? Why am I not choreographing sexy ballets? Where is the cast of my opera? And hey, wait, what are you doing? Aren't you in the same boat?

Elektra's Sister

adapted from Hugo von Hofmannsthal's original German

Elektra's Sister

I cannot sit and stare into the darkness like you.
A fire burns in my breast and drives me through the house.
I cannot bear any room but must run from one doorway to the next.
Upstairs, downstairs, it is as if a voice were calling me.
When I reach it, an empty room gapes back at me.
I am so afraid. My knees tremble day and night.
My throat is bound so tight I cannot even cry.
Everything is stone-heavy.

Sister, have mercy!
It is you who binds me to this ground with iron clamps.
It is your hatred, your sleepless, boundless spirit that they fear.
If not for you, they would let us out of this dungeon.
I want out! I will not sleep here night after night until death!
Before I die, I want life!
Before my body wilts, I want children!
Even if it were a peasant who gives them to me,
I would bear him children and warm them with my body
against the cold nights, when the storm shakes the hut.

Do you hear me? Say something, sister.
Have mercy on yourself and on me.
What good is this torment?

Our father—he is dead. Our brother will not come home.
We sit forever like caged birds on a perch,
turning our heads left and right and no one comes.
Not our brother. Not even a messenger from our brother.
Not even a messenger from a messenger. No one.
With knives each day makes its marks on our faces,
and outside the sun rises and sets—
and women whom I knew slim grow heavy with blessings
and drag themselves to the fountain and can hardly lift their pails.
Then, suddenly, they are freed of their burdens.
They come to the fountain and from them flows a sweet drink,
and life hangs nursing from them, and the children grow and grow!
No! I am a woman, and I want a woman's lot—
Better to be dead than to live without life!

Gay Politicians

Since the first moment I saw him on TV, I wondered how a gay man could be appointed Secretary of Homeland Security, and under George Bush, no less.

An excellent description of the moment, from Annoy.

"Amidst an escalating crisis, and hard, devastating evidence of gross incompetence, if not criminal negligence, Michael Chertoff emerged, looking like a Dungeon Daddy stepping out of a gay bathhouse after a torrid weekend on crystal meth, and unconvincingly attempted to defend FEMA."

I'm glad I'm not the only one who noticed.

Houses

I had roommates throughout college: first in the dorm, then for two years with my friend Alison in an apartment complex, then for a year with a coworker from a diner where I worked and another girl she had interviewed, and then for a year again with Alison in a quaint two-bedroom in the woods near the Athens zoo. I had graduated at that time and was working as a freelance accompanist; she was in graduate school in English education. When she graduated and found work, I was left alone, and the $475 rent was (if you can believe it) out of my budget.

I was fairly depressed at the time. I had broken off with Brent to date Chris; finding that he was not interested in dating me, I began an affair with a boy that lasted one night. I swore off love until I could figure out how I had gotten in such a mess, and then another boy came along, who loved me until a week after I drove him up to Indiana for a summer stock theater gig.

The love life was messy, and work was difficult, but I had one ray of hope: My German professor had offered a one-bedroom cottage on his property to me and my dog Tricky for some $250. I would live behind their splendid Victorian house and maintain close ties with the man who had inspired me to finish my honors thesis. Two weeks before the move, and after several failed attempts to reach him, he told me that his wife had changed her mind: the cottage and yard would be too small for a dog. It was a thin excuse and certainly not the truth, but he left no room for negotiation.

I started looking for a new place immediately and found a house a little outside of Athens proper. I was charmed by its yellow paint, its screened porch and large yard, and its many rooms. It was an actual house, and it could be mine for $500 a month—more than I had been paying, but it was a house, after all, so I could swing it, couldn’t I? I signed the lease and moved in. Tricky was happy, but there were large gaps in the fence, so he couldn’t stay outside. We enjoyed our walks around the neighborhood, which offered enough no-man’s-lands that I didn’t have to worry about picking up after him.

But the house was large and empty. I didn’t have furniture or money to buy any. A singing teacher was getting rid of a matching couch and loveseat and offered them to me. They were dreadful, but my living room was empty, so I took them. For a couple months they sat there, covered in boxes of books and kitchen items I’d never unpacked, as well as bags of laundry and eventually the curtains my mother had sewn for my new house.

The house was depressing, and I was depressed in it. After a while I began to think of it as my cave. It seemed I disappeared into it after work. Certain things got to me: it was already so old and run down that it seemed I’d never be able to clean it. Why bother, when the carpet is old and brown and stinky? Why bother, when the walls of the bedroom are plastered in such a way that it looks like the room is melting? Why bother, when the refrigerator and stove are twenty years old and rusted? Weren’t all these things in about the same state of decay as I was in?

Somehow, though I never mentioned my depression or unhappiness to my parents, they realized that I was having trouble in my new place. They offered to come help me decorate and make it homey. I was frightened to death at the prospect of their seeing how I was living—or barely living. But I let them come, and I was shocked at their understanding. They didn't seem surprised or saddened by the two couches sitting in the middle of the living room with heaps of junk on top. They weren't bothered that three of the chairs to the kitchen table were still propped up in the front room. They weren't phased by the emptiness of the kitchen cabinets. They simply helped me unpack my plates and glasses and find homes for them.

When they left, my house was presentable, and almost comfortable. It still felt like a cave to me, and I still felt like I disappeared when I was home. But when Henry came along I wasn’t afraid to invite him to see my place. I simply cleaned where I could, as one does before company comes, and we sat on my hand-me-down couch and looked at the random pictures I’d hung on the wall: two pieces of very unhangable art I’d bought from a cafe (one nearly completely black and the other almost completely white) and the mysterious impressionistic painting of Atlanta done by my dad’s friend.

But as the year passed, or maybe even two, I began to resent the place: it was too big, too old, too nasty, and I’d spent too many sad moments there. I told myself that the next place I moved would be plastic and have rounded corners. Everything would be sparkling new in that new place. It would have an antiseptic feel. It would be closer to my ideal living space: a hotel room.

Short update

What is the word for when you stammer and blush in the presence of some only to remember having caused the same stutter in others?

And what is the word for when, puffed up with your knowledge and skill, you remember being like a child in the company of those others?

The village genius is the city's junior clerk.