CHAPTER 212 IMPRESSIONS OF MY LIFE: AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A RECHERCHE POET.HAVE I TOLD YOU LATELY THAT I'M DYING. 2017 2016

 CHAPTER 212. HAVE I TOLD YOU LATELY THAT I’M DYING 2017

 

Christmas had been a bit somber. I announced my condition to Iron Faith Fellowship and many promises of pray and help made.  New Years Eve was hardly a celebration. Watching the ball drop was like a symbol of my own dropping. 

But life goes on, doesn’t it. Eventually they might put me in
a hole, but why crawl into one already. I would continue to live as I had been and  not give a thought to what was coming. Early on January 1, 2017 I made my first early morning walk of the New Year. The only concession I made to my strange and awkward gait was the use of a walking stick. I would finally use my parent’s girl on our 25th wedding anniversary as something more than a decoration on the Wall.

My first wall was at Rockwood Museum Park. It opened at sunrise.  More importantly, I could drive up and park at the carriage house which saved me walking up the hill upon which the mansion sat. New Year’s day was cold and the Christmas decorations from Rockwood’s open house celebration were still up. These helped lift my spirits.

I also began talking to my friend Ronald Tipton every
morning on FaceTime. Sometimes modern technology is a good thing. That is Ron Shown from his home on the  upper right. Mark, who was my favorite cat, is nestles on my lap. Mark has since passed away.

I began walking every morning not caring how long it took me to  cover distance. I did avoid any steep hills and stopped going to my favorite place, Brandywine Creek State Park.  I was mostly going to Rockwood now. On the 9th

of January it snowed, but that didn’t stop me. I was out on my trusty walking stick. I wasn’t fearful and I did think about  dying. Just wanted to try to be normal.

But in mid-January I began my regular visits to

the ALS Clinic in the Neurology department at Thomas Jefferson.  I found a better way to the place. Go up I-95 out of Claymont and get off at Exit 20 onto the Columbus Boulevard. The revisionist of History haven changed the name  of that major road to some other name yet as far as I know. All things Columbus have to go these days, Drive East and turn off on Spruce Street. Fist time I went this way, I mistook the exit before that as the street and all to did was put me back on I-95 and I had get off at Callowhill again. I learned to stay past that exit and get to Spruce next time, which took me up a hill on to cobblestones left over from the colonist days. These shaky you car pretty well until a block later you get on some good  old macadam road.

Once pass the bumpity-bump of the cobblestone you past
Old Original Bookbinders. When I worked at Olson Brothers, the head guy, Chairman of the Board,Lou Baylis, took the whole staff here for Christmas dinner. 

We were served Lobster, I mean each of us got a whole one, which are like giant bugs. You had to basically dissect it and it turned me totally against every eating lobster  again. This was not the worst part of the evening, though. There was a open bar, all you could drink, and one of the women took advantage of this and got blotto.  At some point she climbed upon Baylis lap and proceeded to kiss him, offering up her breasts as part of his plate. You could see by his expression he did not take kindly to her tester and we never saw that woman back at the office again.

The clinic however, was interesting, at least the first
time.Again Judy  Guarmieri came into the eating room to greet Lois and I and leads back to the examining rooms.  In the first room I was placed and my vitals and weight was taken. I was then placed in another little room. A parade of varied  doctors came to that room over the next four hours. Yes, four hours, a lot of time to spend on an incurable and untreatable concision, I think.

Dr. Rankocevik. Made an early appearance along with some reassuring pats. Then came a great many performers, including even my very own palliative  doctor. Palliative Care is to mitigate suffering as one passes from this life to the next. Her name was Dr. Susan Parks

(right). This strike me as funny. I told her a Doctor Parkes brought me into this world and I guess a Doctor Parks will take me out. 

I can’t remember the names or the order they popped though that little office door. I can recall some of the things they did. 

There were two ladies who interviewed me and introduced themselves as my Social Workers. 

Of the clinicians was a  Pulmonologist. She was young,
fairly good-looking and very friendly. However her session with me sounded  pornographic. I wondered what anyone standing outside the door thought.

“Blow,” she said. “Blow, blow.”

I blew. The thing felt odd. I blew with all my strength, but felt no resistance. It was like blowing against a wall. It had a fancy name, Incentive Spirometer.

The next thing she handed me  was the opposite. You took it in your mouth and sucked.  Now she was shouting “Suck!  Suck! Suck!”

Somehow these measured my lung capacity and my ability to empty my lungs for my next breath. I don’t recall the exact figures, but my lung capacity was like 47%

.

There was a continuing changing of disciplines. There was a 
Dietician. They weighed me. I had weighted 160 pounds when I first came to the clinic. This would go up over the next couple of years until I was like 185. They liked that. They told me it was very important that I keep my weight up. I was to eat more calorie heavy food. “Eat more candy and cake,”  she told me. “When I left there I should go get myself a big milkshake.”

I said to her, “are you sure you’re a doctor? I never had any doctor tell me to eat those things.”

There were several therapists that popped in to maul me. They wanted to see me walk and were unhappy that I was using my walking stick. They wanted me to use a walker or at least a cane. I didn’t feel ready for these. They were old man stuff. I was fine just using  my walking stick.

They had me drink some water just to watch it go down my neck.

Then they began grabbing an foot and tell me not to let
them push it  down, somewhat the same with my arms. The person pressing against me sang out a number each time, usually a 5, which I believe was an indication my muscle was strong.

This stuff was repeated at every clinic visit over the next couple years until Covid hit and the clinic stopped meeting in 2021.