Jesus said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”
Jana & I are carrying on & drinking apple cider in the car on the way back to school from the radiology center. I was getting chest x-rays done per the request of the school’s Health Center, where I had gone that morning to find out why I was still coughing dryly & why I had woken up with startling, near-paralyzing chest pains. This is monday afternoon, here in the car. Ten days ago I had woken up with similar chest pains, only much more startling & paralyzing in the true way, & they had diagnosed me with pleurisy. Pleurisy is the inflammation of the sac that holds yr lungs in yr chest, causing them to rub painfully against both the sac & yr ribs. I would bet that it feels every bit as painful as it sounds, the only problem is that what I had wasn’t pleurisy.
Because that monday afternoon in the car with Jana, my phone rings. Luke calls to say that the campus police have just called the room asking for me, & he’s given them my cell phone number. He says he doesn’t think it’s bad, but be ready for it. In the ten seconds that rest heavily between hanging up the phone & hearing it ring again, the car gets suddenly hot & Jana tells me not to worry. I haven’t done anything, I couldn’t have done anything. When the police call me, my confusion only gets worse. The voice on the end of the phone is young, nervous. He asks me if I have just gotten x-rays done, & when I say that I have he tells me to get to the emergency room immediately. The radiologist has called the school & has told them to get me immediate, emergency care. He doesn’t know why, but he asks me if I need an ambulance. I say no thanks, I tell Jana to turn around & go back to the hospital. Having hung up the phone, I am suddenly shaking & stifled by the air in the car again; I don’t do fright very well. Jana is casual, trying to joke around to make me feel better, but she is just as confused & frightened as I am. This five minute car ride to the ER is one of the most nervous moments of my life.
In the hospital, we find the waiting room & I introduce myself to the receptionist. No, I can’t say why I’m there, sorry. I was told to come here, I just had x-rays done, can you find out what’s happening, please? I fill out the forms, sit & watch little children play with empty McDonald’s bags while their parents watch CNN on television. Anna Nicole is still dead, her body still in limbo; this is the news. The receptionist calls the doctor, & with me watching her at the desk her eyes widen & she says Oh my God, thank goodness he came back. She hangs up, grimaces sympathetically, asks me Having some trouble breathing, honey? I grin like someone who just doesn’t know, say No ma’am, I feel perfectly all right. Suddenly nurses sweep in from sliding glass doors, tell me not to take one step, bring me a wheelchair & order me to sit down before moving another inch. Jana is laughing, but she’s nervous, & she stays by my side. We are both young & terrified, too nervous to be honest about it.
I am wheeled hurriedly to Trauma Ward Room 6, where I change behind a curtain into a hospital gown & wait for someone new to show up. A confidently pretty blond nurse named Carrie joins Jana & me in the room, looking concerned but smiling still. I still don’t know what’s happening, still waiting in darkness for someone to shed some light on the situation. I am still grinning like a dufus. Carrie says that my lung has collapsed, how substantially she doesn’t know right now, & the three of us in the room share furrowed brows. I crack some kind of joke to ease the situation, & for some reason we all laugh. Carrie explains how when the doctor arrives, they’re going to have to cut into my left side & slide a tube between two of my ribs, through the sac that I once thought was inflamed, & up against my lung. This is how they deal with spontaneous pneumothorax, most common in tall, slim males between the ages of 20 & 24. There is no reason other than genetics, this is medical spontenaity at its finest. The purpose of the operation will be to pump the air out from around my left lung that has been slowly collapsing it for the past ten days. This is what I thought was just a common case of viral pleurisy; later I will find out that my lung was 75% collapsed, & that somehow I was managing with just one. This is why the nurses were all so concerned. This is why everyone was too afraid to tell me what was going on.
I give Jana my cell phone, & she starts making calls to my mother & father. I get to speak to my mom before they pump something into my arm with a needle, & she asks me if they told me that it was going to hurt, a lot. They hadn’t told me that, but when I ask Carrie, she taps the end of the needle & tells me that yes, it’s going to hurt. A lot. I make another wisecrack, we all laugh, but I think my ease is making Carrie more nervous, & she shoots little sideways glances at me when I tell her I’m going through with this unmedicated. In fact, I say, I want them to punch me in the lung right before they begin. That way I’ll be more of a man. No one finds that very funny, I feel like I should apologize for some reason, & I think Jana & Carrie are both a little grateful when they finally pump me with the sedative. As they wheel me into the operating room, I take a last look back at Jana, who cries to me that she’ll make more calls & square everyone away. This is my first time in the hospital since they put tubes in my ears at 18 months old. If the lights weren’t so fuzzed & the voices so heavy, I might feel scared. This is the magic of medicine, ladies & gentlemen.
The next four days or so are slow & uncomfortable. My father drives down from our home in Springfield, my mom trains it from Connecticut. Nurses & friends come in & out of my room on the fourth floor, taking my vitals in the middle of the night, asking about my pain. There isn’t very much, but that doesn’t mean I get any sleep. With a tube sticking out from under mounds of bandages on my side, there isn’t much movement going on. I am x-rayed, cat-scanned, poked, prodded, annoyed. While the rest of campus has a snow day, my Valentine’s Day is spent waiting for lab results & drifting in & out of stiff, filthy naps. I cannot shower. I pee into a bottle, sitting on the edge of my bed. Hospitals are not meant for resting, I discover this quickly.
Eventually the tube is taken out – they yank it with their hands quickly while you exhale, causing minimal pain but a lot of tension while you wait for that eternal tug – & my mom washes the scabs off of my scalp in the bathroom sink. I wait for 24 hours bored, tired, & not entirely without pain while the doctor ruminates over labs & decides when I can leave. Thursday night they wheel me out the front door, & the world looks changed; there are piles of snow that weren’t there the last time I was outside, & everything is covered in patches of ice. This is the end of my hospital stay but from what they tell me, there’s a good chance that now that it’s collapsed once, it’s bound to happen again. In the end, I’ll be back, & for that reason I am still afraid to sleep easily.
As for Little Women, I’m not the biggest fan of the style of writing, but the story has its perks. The characters are likeable for the most part, although I don’t think Jo had a fair wrap in the end. In fact, neither did Beth. She may be the immortal grievance of the novel, in my mind. I haven’t yet watched the first scheduled adaptation, but I look forward to discussing the book in class, at least. School is back in session.
