Light

It snowed here last night. It's really cold but beautiful.

Errol is really out of it right now - post-opish. They've got him sedated and doped up on pain meds (sounds like my twenties). No operating heavy machinery for Errol, today. He had a really bad day yesterday - working so hard to breathe - and the PCICU team wants him sleeping and stable for the weekend so that he can get his strength back.

Errol is most likely going to have surgery to have a pacemaker installed either Monday or Thursday. We still hope his heart becomes synchronous, and there are some encouraging signs, but if things stay the same they will have to open him up.
They say it's not a big deal, "we just go into the chest, but we don't have to open up the heart." Try telling that to Errol's poor chest which is just now starting to heal. But I suppose it's better now than later.

We will definitely be here for Christmas and almost certainly for New Year's. Before you feel too sorry for us, please know that there is an espresso stand in the hospital!!!! I know that won't make Errol feel better (they won't let me put him on a latte-drip - bastards!), only getting healthy and home will really do the trick.

Sometimes when I see Errol in pain, straining for breath, miserable, pulling at his tubes, suffering, I wonder if we are doing the right thing to work so hard to save him. I wonder if there is enough light in his life to outweigh the suffering. But if I step out of the PCICU tunnel and look at just one picture of Errol smiling, the wondering stops.

Before the last surgery, I thought we were going to lose Errol. I thought: this is the best person I've ever known (sorry Katie Couric), he's achieved enlightenment, he's spreads joy to all. What a huge pity to lose such a rare and blissful light.

The snow is starting to melt outside. It will be a long time here at the hospital but one day we will step out into the sunlight and Errol will look up to us and smile.