One Word - Two Possibilities

The word "besotted" is a wonderfully old-fashioned word; it just doesn't come up in general conversation or even in much writing these days. And to add to its charm, it has two distinct definitions.

Here is my fear.

Two definitions: 1) infatuated, 2) dulled with drink.

Here is my fear. One relationship; two people; both definitions accurate.

Staying Off Those Roads - John's Quote

Was out with a friend (J.) last night. Got to feeling somewhat contemplative about - what else - the SCA. I guess it's either that or affairs of the heart, so it's the SCA today.

I had my arrest in the ER. I had gone in after awaking with an odd sensation in my chest. I got there with about 1o minutes to spare and then ----sudden cardiac arrest. The hospital is on Wrightsville Avenue. So much for background. (Oh, my friend had had a few beers; I was on driving duty - for a change of pace; that's normally his job).

In my contemplative moment, I commented to J. that Wrightsville Avenue is one of my favorite routes towards the city. BUT that sometimes when I drive past that hospital, I find myself anxious all over again about what had happened there.

My friend leaned in, looked somewhat quizzical and said -

"Just don't drive on Wrightsville Avenue".

Out of the mouths of beer bottles........

New Favorite Cartoon

I have accepted that surviving Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA) has numerous consequences. My humor probably has never been 'mainstream' or of the Reader's Digest variety. Always been a little edgy. Not a Jay Leno fan, but yes to Craig Ferguson, Jon Stewart, Lewis Black.

But now, at times, the humor is downright macabre.

My new favorite New Yorker cartoon:

Man opening his apartment door to the hallway after someone rang his doorbell.

There stands the spectre (specter??) of death - you know the image: a hooded cape-like garment and the scythe or machete or whatever it is.

Death is handing the man a note of some sort.

Caption: Don't freak out, it's just a 'save the date' card.

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I like it so much, I've ordered a copy so I can mat and frame it.

I am Happy - Who Knew THAT Would Happen?

OK, so maybe the one year anniversary of the Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA) is not a total bust. I realized today that I am happy. Actually happy. I wake up happy.
How did that happen?

Reason # 1 -  my heart is still beating - that's a plus to be sure. The implanted defibrillator has not fired.  Another major plus. 2- I bought some new furniture a while back; it was delivered yesterday, including a quite funky chair (photo above). Love it. Love the whole room, actually.

So, heart, chair --- oh yes,  love it here in my new home town. It is what I had hoped it would be when I selected it a few years back - fun, lively, and soothing to my jagged soul.

My home is peaceful. A year ago, it was anything but peaceful. My heart had stopped, I had a defibrillator implanted, my alcoholic ex was out of sobriety and apparently had been (on the sly) for quite some time. Had been before we moved, so pretty big lie there. Betrayal. My days were filled with raw fear about the heart, the long healing on the defibrillator Skippy, the need for a 2nd cath, loathing the ex, waiting for him to move out and just fear, fear, fear. And  no driving for 90 days. Very few friends here as I had just moved. Lots of visitors, but few local friends.

And now, one enormous year later - my home is peaceful, I have stopped wasting energy loathing the ex and now just wish him health, albeit from a distance. I have friends both here and in far places. I get to the beach probably 3 times every week. My dog, Stella, is aging at 13, but still a joy. Dogs are allowed back on the beach now after a long summer of banishment. We walked an hour+ yesterday - it was like a doggy parade down there.

And one more - I have enough of a crush on an OMD (object of my desire guy) that regardless of what does or does not happen with him, I am confident I will be able to love a man again. And I had my doubts; I wondered if I were so broken after decades of loving or attempting to love an alcoholic who couldn't stay in recovery - I thought I might really be tapped out.
But what a joy - I'm confident again.

So why am I happy? The heart still beats, I will love again, my new home town is a joy in so many ways, I am finally done with the ex, I have an OMD, my dog is alive and puppy-happy, I have friends I love, my home is peaceful.

And I just love that chair.

"MEN" - re-Posted --- Just because I feel like it.

(from a few weeks ago - still torturing myself)

Men

Well, the title should probably more accurately be "Selecting men". Subtitle: Not a damn thing to do with Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA). Men - I have abaaaaad track record here. Starting as a child; my first crush was overwhelming; I was more than smitten; I was in love at around age 7 or 8. Utterly, staggeringly, feverishly in love. And the Object of My Desire? (OMD) None other than Sonny Jurgensen. Pre-Redskins; he was a Philadelphia Eagle. He and his favorite receiver and drinking buddy Tommy McDonald went to my church. Sonny may have been an electrifying quarterback, but he was a wee bit short of a model citizen. Boozer, party-er, too many DUI's to count, trotted out on field with a very impressive beer belly. He bordered on being a bum. Certainly in the "bad boy" camp. My hero.


Yes, this was my first crush. My mom and dad thought it was cute, which brings their parenting skills into sharp relief. A quick trip to a child psychiatrist might have been prudent.


After Sonny, let's see how my men-selection skills matured - turn to the Beatles. In the late sixties, little girls divided into two camps. The smart girls who would be good at choosing husbands - they liked Paul. You know, the cute one, the nice one, the one who loved one woman for decades. The good husband. Me? No, of course not. I thought Paul was insipid, untalented and dull. My skills took me from Sonny to the edgier John L. I was drawn, naturally, to the future heroin addict. Apparently, what we look for in a man is set at a very young age.


And so it continues. The ex-husband, old what's his name, is definitely in the bad boy camp. In his day, his looks, 'style' and persona were of the semi-dangerous ilk. While he's been called many things, insipid is not one of them. But I digress.

And now, I am drawn once again to a not-Paul McCartney guy, my current, unrevealed OMD. I think he's a step up from John L and old what's his name and certainly from Sonny J, but who really knows? Today, we are merely friends (well that's a crappy word - we are wonderfully friends, just not the other)/. I THINK he MIGHT be a step in the right direction, but my self talk goes like this:

(Angel is played by the one who says run, run, run away from this guy. Devil is we know what).

Angel: Really??? Ok, he is smart, quick, honest, magnificently funny, cute, kind. Seems to have at least the minimum level of introspection, but let's see - have I EVER been interested in a man who didn't drink too much?

Devil: the heart wants what it wants.

Angel: Oh, grow up. That is just an excuse for another round of self-destructive behavior. And now you have Skippy to think about - how can you do that to him?

Devil: Life is short. I want what I want. I love his company. He makes me laugh. I have fun - excellent, excellent, excellent fun.

Angel: Has it dawned on you that the list of incompatibilities is 10 times longer than the list of compatibilities?

Devil: Would someone please kill that Angel. It is really on my last nerve.

Perhaps I could make a dress or hoop skirt out of some combination of traffic cones and crime scene tape - all saying

"BEWARE - train wreck ahead. Train wreck ahead".

I Can Be Such a Jerk

Geez. We like to think of ourselves as nice people, but sometimes, I just have to wonder what the hell I was thinking.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with a former colleague who had lost his wife years ago - all I had known was that her death was sudden and she was horribly young (+- 40) and had left behind a husband and multiple young children. Yesterday, he told me that she was in the SCA 98% - she died of Sudden Cardiac Arrest. (Back then, I think they were still often calling it Sudden Death Syndrome. I have one RN who calls it that - as you might imagine, not my favorite term).

We know 98% don't survive. Being in the 2% club is obviously a matter of great luck, though I know some believe that our survival and their death are part of some "plan" - not me - I just think I was extraordinarily lucky that day. I woke up to odd sensations; she did not wake up.

But back to my being a jerk. I have whined and complained about the defibrillator, about dealing with fears, about the looming specter of dating and revealing this crap, about people expecting me to have earth-shattering revelations, blah blah blah.

I have also been grateful - very, very grateful. But not enough.

This morning as I thought about our conversation yesterday and what he and his children lived through - the horror, the shock of that day, the incomprehesibilty of it and all they had to come to terms with.

I need to make amends to my loved ones who got and made the phone calls that morning. They were told I was near death (well, technically true, I guess. But I was never 'sick' - the heart stopped, they restarted it and I felt fine.). They were told I could have serious heart damage and/or brain damage (happily, I had neither. Aside from an ever-deteriorating memory that is probably utterly unrelated to SCA).

They got those phone calls. I can now picture it; making the decisions about who was traveling to Wilmington when, who was to talk with the doctors, all that. Happily for them, this was short lived - I was up and around and fine later the same day. Shell-shocked at the events, scared, confused, but up and around nonetheless.

They got and made those phone calls. I'm not sure I have stopped to genuinely consider what that day was like for them. Unlike my former colleague, their horror lasted only a day; his was probably interminable. But I never have asked them what their day was like; I have told them (probably ad nauseum) what MINE was like, but I guess I felt entitled to that level of self-absorption. I mean, if we are not permitted to be self-focussed about surviving Sudden Cardiac Arrest, then when?

I can be such a jerk. I will make my amends.

Skies and Birthdays

The sky. The sky is a gift. Tonight, it is one of those very very black skies offset with grey-ish white whispy clouds that partially obscure a brilliantly white not-full moon. That's the best description I can come up with and it falls so far short that it's embarrassing.

One day this week, I spent an early evening out on the friend's boat. We went out at around 4 and got back in around 9 - after dark. No swimming that day, just a slow, lazy cruise. Another perfect day. Your breath is taken away at each turn; ocean breakers in the distance, pristine marsh grasses, dolphins playing nearby -- just a magnificent day. And as we eventually turned for home, the sky... It was a mixed sky - some clouds, some sun and the colors gradually turned brilliant - so many shades of fierce red and pink and white slowly, slowly turning to black.

We both were transfixed by it - without comment for the longest time. Finally I said that it was one of those skies that it was wasteful to attempt to photograph - no picture ever could get it. An almost trite thought, admittedly.

I have just one word for a day like that - gratitude. Grateful for my friend, for his boat and for those skies. Grateful to be here - first to "be" after a year and also to be "here" in this spectacular place. And again, so grateful for my friend.

PS. Skippy's birthday is past. Tomorrow is old-what's-'is-name's birthday (aka the Ex). This will be, I think, the first time in 27 years that I will let it pass un-marked. No card, no call, no email. Before, even in our separated/divorced years, I always contacted him; I dreaded the idea that he would get no cards or no calls. This year, at long last, it just doesn't matter to me.
I believe the excision/exorcism is complete.