That Moment, Redux
Four years ago, I wrote (in a different space) about moments in which you know something has changed and your life will be different--like the moment a light comes on.
Early this month, a similar moment, even closer to home, came along and my life has changed again. Three-and-a-half weeks later, my husband is home from a heart-specialty hospital in southern Ontario, complete with a replumbed heart.
He is doing well.
I am still slightly bewildered.
But yesterday I came home from the day's errands to find him tilted back in his desk chair in his office, playing FreeCell, as he would have been a month ago. This morning I read a draft of his final report to the granting agency that funded his novel last year. He is recuperating, finding his way back or perhaps forward--pick a metaphor.
I am writing, too, of course. Because that's how I figure out bewildered, how I put bewildered into little containers labeled MTWThF with separate sets for AM and PM, how I serve bewildered onto a plate for sustenance and to minimize side effects, how I strap bewildered onto his arm and watch the cuff inflate and write down numbers, how I harness bewildered to learn what to watch for and how to solve problems.
And slowly, bewildered becomes the thing I understand, becomes what people are fond of calling "new normal," becomes just more life, more days/weeks/months/years.
My husband is recuperating, as am I. And we write.
Early this month, a similar moment, even closer to home, came along and my life has changed again. Three-and-a-half weeks later, my husband is home from a heart-specialty hospital in southern Ontario, complete with a replumbed heart.
He is doing well.
I am still slightly bewildered.
But yesterday I came home from the day's errands to find him tilted back in his desk chair in his office, playing FreeCell, as he would have been a month ago. This morning I read a draft of his final report to the granting agency that funded his novel last year. He is recuperating, finding his way back or perhaps forward--pick a metaphor.
I am writing, too, of course. Because that's how I figure out bewildered, how I put bewildered into little containers labeled MTWThF with separate sets for AM and PM, how I serve bewildered onto a plate for sustenance and to minimize side effects, how I strap bewildered onto his arm and watch the cuff inflate and write down numbers, how I harness bewildered to learn what to watch for and how to solve problems.
And slowly, bewildered becomes the thing I understand, becomes what people are fond of calling "new normal," becomes just more life, more days/weeks/months/years.
My husband is recuperating, as am I. And we write.