Stay away from hospitals

I am back. I can only assume that yesterday's post made it up. I could check and I will after this, but I got another one of those "anonymous" comments on my blog. It complemented me on my posting. I knew then it was spam. I mean, it was not a great post, certainly not comment worthy. Others have been, damn, I have begged for comments but received none. I used to feel good about those comments but they are not real, so it is back to no feedback for me. I have to fill in the blanks and that cannot be a good thing. It is never a good idea to create your own feedback, because you never know if it is "real" or truthful or you filtering out what you do not want to hear or deal with and only listening to the positives. Therefore, it becomes very difficult to make needed adjustments.

That is a long winded way of me saying that I do not mind criticism. I am not perfect but I am capable of learning, so I do not take it personally. Besides, I can usually hear the subtext and figure out, or at least weigh the credibility, of anybody who has an agenda that is moved forward by straight criticism. I judge it accordingly.

I am not sure where this is all headed. Well, in the large sense, I do know. That is inevitable. It stares me in the face when I look around me and see those around me getting older and more frail. My buddy's father, who went to high school with my father (to put it in an age related context), just had bypass surgery two weeks ago. The surgery seemed to go well but there were post operative complications that reared their ugly heads. He is still in the hospital but there have been two subsequent surgeries (that I know of) one of which was related and the other was a pre-existing condition that was made worse while in the hospital.

The point of that is that my thoughts are with him and his family. It also reminds me that you should NEVER go to the hospital unless it is necessary. Little good comes of going in there. Hell, my father went in, he walked in, he did not walk out, though. I do not blame the hospital for that part. They did their best but then again there were things that sort of rankled me.

Here is a sad story. Well that start with keep the readers reading won't it?. When my father was back in for his last go round (would have been around this time in 1990 by the way), me and my siblings were all in Europe, though my sister was in Israel. I was the last to leave but the first to call home. I left on the 11th of July and returned on the 22nd of July. My brother came home on the 29th of July and my sister came home on the 25th of July but her luggage came home on the 27th. Why am I telling you all this? I think I wanted to make a joke about the missing luggage.

Anyway, it was the August long weekend and my father's roommate, actually an old dude who was my father's first doctor, had expired. It was the Saturday and I get down to the hospital to find my father in his bed, outside the room, while the staff futzed about with newly dead doctor. My father, who was still very much alive at the time (I think they just finished his chemo at that time) was left outside of his room, though in a bed, in the hall, while a corpse inhabited the room alone. Is this perverse? You have a guy who is alive but being treated like a slab of meat festering and forgotten about in the hallway, but a corpse is given the Royal treatment and now has a semi-private room as a private room. Yet, the corpse cannot enjoy the privacy.

I did tell the nurse something should be done. I believe I used the terms "Tag him, bag him and get him out and my father back in." When all was said and done, and believe me I meant no disrespect to the good but late doctor, but there was nothing that could be done for him, but my father was still alive and he was playing second fiddle to a former being, an ex-person, a corpse, he was placed in the next room with another future "goner".

This guy was interesting, though, I could not understand a word he said. His son was in to visit (for the last time) from Calgary. He brought in a case of beer, which he stored in his father's hospital room locker. The old guy really thought he was getting better and wanted to leave. He kept saying he was leaving. His wife referred to him as a "stupid man", though she was right, he did not leave walking out of there. He too, expired. Though, they did not move my father again for the one. To much work, I guess, as he had the window view instead of the aisle, er door.

I am not sure what the point of this all is. I guess it is to say that life is fragile. Our elders are getting older as we are and that means there will be trips to the hospital. Some will end well, while others will not. I would say life sucks but pushing up the daisies does not seem like nearly as much fun, so hug a child today. It should be your own, but if it is not, do me a favor and keep it a non-sexual hug, okay? Ciao!