Room 602

What a week! One of those I would have taken a pass on if given the opportunity. I'd take delayed trains and a funky commute over this past week any day! I guess life always manages to put things into perspective for us. And such was my week.

Three days this week were spent with the women of Room 602 at Methodist Hospital - as a visitor (thank goodness for small favors!). You couldn't have asked for a more compatable, diverse group of women to be trapped in one room together. We had the Bronx represented, as well as Brooklyn, African-American, Nuyorican (New York born Puerto Rican), Italian, and an Eastern European mix.

Medical histories were shared, as well as recipies for pernil (Puerto Rican pork shoulder) and chinese food, stories of past work lives, dead husbands, children, grandchildren and pets. Dreams were discussed, spanish soap operas, Michael Jackson updates reported, and the newspaper passed around.

Everyone came off their pain meds around the same time, moaning and groaning in a chorus, followed by about 45 minutes of demerol happiness, laughter and story-telling, followed by two hours of sleep. Then it was up to eat (for those who could - half the room was on NPO), more conversations about food, inattentive doctors, IV bags running dry, and time for more pain meds.

The nurses and nurse techs didn't mind coming to room 602: the air conditioning was on - something everyone agreed upon. Yes, there was the brief time when the knob on one of the air conditioners broke and after waiting for engineering to come (about 15 minutes), bed "C" who was ambulatory with IV pole, went in search of equippement to fix it herself. After attemps at using a pair of scissors to turn the broken knob (helped by a gardening glove that bed "D" happened to have in her purse), bed "C" went to another room and took a knob off of someone else's air conditioner. Problem solved.

When someone was cold, someone else wandered off and raided the linen closet for blankets. They teased the nurse tech who did blood pressure, temps, and took blood, nicknaming her the "vampire". But she could slide a needle in and out without your needing a bandaid and without leaving a bruise. She was the epitome of German engineering!

And they all agreed that in life, they could be real b**ches. But I've never met a group of women more soft in the middle than this bunch. Yes - they spoke their minds. Yes - they demanded that they be treated with respect and not ignored. But their love for family and those closest to them, their compassion for those around them...big mouths, yes...big hearts, for sure.

Yep. It was one of those weeks that offers up a life lesson. I thank God for my health. But I'm also thankful for the three days spent with some incredible women with incredible life stories to tell. Thanks to them for keeping life real.

Now I've Seen (or Heard) It All

Under the category of, "I've-lived-in-NYC- 22 years-what-haven't-I-seen?' I am pleased to announce that it happened last night on the Amtrak home. Train travel this week has not been pleasant. It began with the horrible commuter train crash in Washington DC, a 4.5 hour trip home Tuesday night (30 minute delay on Amtrak and no-signals on the "F" train), and ended up with what I had hoped would be a quiet ride home last night.

I was on the 5:55pm (Washington to Boston), which moves a bit faster and has more of a 'business suit' crowd. I was able to find a seat to myself and comfortably settled in with my Subway tuna sandwich and Cool Ranch chips (recommendation: put the chips in the sandwich...it's noisy, but yummy!)

Footnote for my techie friends: at least 1/3rd of commuters are now using netbooks on the train, versus full-scale computers.


About 30 minutes into the ride the woman ahead of me, who has been on the phone since I got on the train, begins shifting the conversation. To phone sex. Interesting. Not quite as interesting when you can only hear one side of the conversation. Still...interesting. Now...she was speaking quietly and using an appropriate phone voice, still....

I'm not sure the guy she was talking with (yes, I figured it was a guy through the types of questions she was asking!) was any more comfortable than I was. I learned he'd never done this before ("your first-time, huh? That's ok, I'll help you through it") and I think his comfort level was about equal to mine because after ten minutes to talk she couldn't get him to go any further (for my sports friends: I'd say they were stuck between first and second and he was caught in a run down).

It eventually ended with her saying things like, "so you don't want to tell me that," "why can't you say that?" and "fine, I'm ok with that," then the call ended. I guess she wasn't so 'ok with that'. Poor guy.

I must say...commuting life does have its' moments!

A Letter from Dad's Sister

I received a letter from Aunt Betty today. She's dad's sister. At age 78, she's still been working full time. However, the firm she worked for shut its' doors last month and now she is home. Can you imagine spending all those years working, then suddenly having nothing? She feels so lost. I'm not sure that, at that age, I'd want to be re-inventing myself, trying to figure out my role, how my days will go....

She also gave me an update on her tree in the backyard. Some of dad and my Uncle Allen are scattered under the tree. Aunt Betty says there have never been so many flowers on the tree! I believe it. Dad loved to be out in the garden and yard: he trimmed the grass almost every night. Aunt Betty has a gorgeous yard, right at the foot of a big hill.

It's father's day this weekend. And the anniversary of dad's death in a couple of weeks. Am I ready?