On: Stranger Angels

On:  Stranger Angels

Colleen Rogers
Original Post:  February 18, 2018

Many years ago, I had open heart surgery.  On the day of the big event, my husband walked me down a long, stark hall to the surgical “suite” as if it was some secret royal spa.  As we walked the “last mile”, there were several other patients alongside of me.  Each of us was in our own private hell, with broken parts that we did not know could be fixed.  Trying to keep up our collective spirits, I referenced the show “Fear Factor” in a lame attempt at humor.  My comedy was not well-received, and I smirked at my husband, who acknowledged everyone’s lack of joviality.  I guess having your arse exposed by a hospital gown covered with a thin blanket of modesty does not lend itself to any improvisational frivolity.

When I was finally placed on an unforgiving metallic table, I saw the two anesthesiologists for the first time.  The one I will never forget was named Kevin.  Because he was Irish, as am I, I felt that the Karma of Blarney Luck would be my blessing.  Kevin would at least get my humor, and if a red-headed Leprechaun was to be my last vision on this Earth, God did me a solid.  He was wearing a regulation surgical “hat”, and I told him that he looked like a school cafeteria lady on State Inspection Day.  He was roaring with laughter, and I knew I was good.  Right about that time, the nurse cut off both my wedding and engagement rings in case of post-surgical swelling.  A tear trickled down my face, and my wonderful, but fearfully stoic, husband kissed me goodbye and was ordered to leave.  Kevin then gave me the Irish wink and a nod, told me to do a count, gingerly touched my head, and I knew I’d be back.

I Zen-woke to the sound of clanking carts and muffled speaking.  Waking up from anesthesia is like alien-floating.  You are about to land exposed on a planet unknown, but you don’t even care if you are abducted.  You are already being held hostage.  The first thing I did was look for my husband, who was not yet able to be at my side.  Then, I looked for Kevin.  He was gone, but I had landed safely.  He did me a solid, and I never saw him again.  

The time in Intensive Care was a mindless blur of morphine drips and few coherent recollections.  Like Martha Stewart says, “It’s a good thing.”  It seemed like an eternity before I was moved to a regular hospital room.  Thinking that my new “studio apartment” was the ticket out, I was shocked to discover that this first venture on my own was only the inaugural leg toward recovery.  My cracked ribs made sleeping horizontally an impossibility.  I sat up each night trying to rest in a chair, listening to the moaning of other patients, more clanking of carts, and the continuous work-laughter of the staff on the floor.  I would thumb through the cache of magazines my sister bought for me, and basically make every night a teenage slumber party. 

My partner in crime was an affable Filipino nurse.  She and I would flip through the magazines together, and wonder why J-Lo had all the booty, and we were stuck with two flat pancake butts.  We would jealously admire J-Lo’s hair, her clothes, her makeup, etc.  Our giggling cattiness each night made me feel less like a broken one-hundred year old, and more like the girl I remembered being.  I hope this wonderful woman is still a Nurse.  I often wonder. 

As a part of the “recovery half-way house” rules, and so I could bust out of “hospital prison”, I had to prove that I was able to walk on my own.   So, as part of my “probation”, I walked countless times a day back and forth down the recovery wing hallway.  Every time I walked  passed the nurses’ station, I gave the nurses that “Mom, would this bother you" smirk that kids make.  I wanted to be sure 
that each staff member NOTICED ME. 

Every day I trained like an amateur Marathoner.  I struggled with the I. V. pole, scuffling along with grippy hospital socks.  With my punky, gross hair and my Zombie-like rhythm, I shoveled tenaciously along. 

At the end of the hallway was this lady patient.  No matter how many times she saw me pass she always royal-waved and nodded in encouragement.  I speculated that she was a woman in her early fifties, and I overheard the nurses say that she had some “female trouble”.  Her room was littered with floral arrangements, enough for a Queen’s Coronation.  Unlike the tattered hospital gown I sported, she was wearing a satiny robe that made her look like a Geisha.  She was petite and had rippling dark hair and blue eyes.  She was a tiny Elizabeth Taylor.  I felt extra sorry for her because she was the type of woman who genuinely should never endure any trouble other than running out of Russian tea cakes.  Without even going in to her room to speak, though, I could feel that she was rooting for me.

One day, while making my usual pass, one of the nurses nodded and gave me a single red rose.  It was the color of a Geisha robe.  I knew it was from the lady down the hall.  I went to thank her, but she  was whisked carefully home.  I truly do hope that her life returned to lovely.  

At the opposite end of my hallway trek was an elderly black man.  He was an older version of Morgan Freeman.  He had a shock of snow white hair, though, and was more softly reserved.  Like the Geisha lady, he supported me by giving me “two thumbs up” at each of my passes.  When I went in his room to talk with him, he said that he had some issues with his lungs.  I noticed that no one ever visited him.  He said his wife was ill, and wasn’t able to come to the hospital.  I asked him if he had children, which I immediately regretted.  He said that he did, hung his head, and said no more.  When he was released, he had no one to pick him up.  They wheeled him down to the front of the hospital with a bus schedule in his hand.  He was a good, loving man, and I wished that he had been a part of my own family.  When he left that day, he assured me that I was gonna make it.  I hugged him goodbye in his wheelchair, and went back to my room.  I did not walk that day.  I just cried like a child for it all.  

We do not know when we will come upon an Angel...what their form will be or why we will need them--but they give you a gift in your trauma--an unexpected union, a shared victory, and a glimpse of humanity.

Image courtesy of:

https://www.123rf.com/stock-photo/angel.html?sti=nlqj2ewy4108svfnbh|