Here’s something I don’t get: is everyone as afflicted as I am? A year or two ago, my friend Ed said, “Well, the decline may be slow, or it may be fast, it’s coming.” It sure is. Viz. and to wit:
1. Let’s start with a big one: in 1998, I had a 90% blockage of my left anterior descending artery—I now know that they call that the “widow block.” The doc invited me to watch the angioplasty on a screen above a bed. As if. When it was over, my AIG colleagues sent me a lovely bouquet. The doc said, stiltedly, “These will look lovely in your home.” Casual and easy-going he wasn’t, but he was digging around in my heart.
2. 2001. The right hip had to go. It wasn’t arthritic or anything; the doc asked if I’d had any trauma to it. I remembered later that in grad school, in a pick up basketball game, some guy about 6’8” blocked a layup which I insisted on continuing with. Boom. I bounced off the floor on my hip. For six months after the surgery, my hair wouldn’t grow. I asked the surgeon about it, and he just grinned and shrugged. I protested, “Geez, figure it out, and there could be a Nobel in this for you!”
3. A couple of months later, I developed deep vein thrombosis and walked around on a blood clot in my calf for ten days. Once discovered, the clot required months of blood thinners.
4. Now it gets fuzzy; the pain all runs together, like the buzz from a Percocet. The arthritis began to kick in soon after the blood clot, and, for a time, my hands and wrists hurt so much that I couldn’t open a jar. CBD lotion helps.
5. Years and years of depression and anxiety, especially when I was working at AIG. They started me on an old favorite, Wellbutrin, which made me either (1) feel a lot more anxious or (2) cry while I was driving home.
6. When I was pitching to Kate, she snapped a line drive past my ear and I turned funny and tore the meniscus in my right knee. Knee surgery. That doc was foolishly optimistic that it would all work out, because…
7. Arthritis settled into my right knee, and I had my right knee replaced. The surgeon told Nancy that my old knee looked “disgusting.” Later, in a followup, he looked at the x-ray and stated proudly, “I’d show that to anyone.” Good for you, Pete.
8. A cabinet door fell off its hinges on my left pinkie finger and broke it so badly that I needed surgery. Back in 1980 or so, the middle joint had quit working because I had jammed it so often trying to catch various balls squarely and failing, so a doc fused it. He said, “The resemblance to this and a normal finger is completely coincidental.”
9. When I was 14 and pitching, someone popped up a short ball down the first baseline. Though either the catcher or first baseman is supposed to take it, when you’re only 14, pitchers feel they should make the play, so I ran after it, and I collided with the catcher—specifically, his mask, which he hadn’t thrown off. It killed one of my front teeth, and I had to have a root canal. Over 50 years later, that tooth finally decided it had had enough, and broke off altogether. I had to have a very expensive implant. Oddly, the dentist was worried because he couldn’t get my blood pressure down, but he went ahead with the operation. The high blood pressure was apparently a sign of what became my…
10. Second angioplasty: we flew to Boston and then took the bus/ferry to Martha’s Vineyard for my niece’s wedding (picture of Kate as flower girl attached in 2009). I felt great, carried heavy suitcases up and down ferry staircases. And then walking around Little Italy, I had the old familiar pain in my chest. My Brookline cousin directed me to Beth Israel Deaconess, a teaching hospital for Harvard, so at one point there were five cardiologists at my bedside, each younger than the one previous. My roommate was an old Italian fellow who called out to himself, “Rose, Rose, you were going to call me tonight, but you didn’t, Rose. I hope you’re having a good evening, Rose.” Over and over. Finally at 2 a.m. I said, “Sir? I’m trying to sleep?” And he said, “Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t know.” After the procedure (procedure is to operation as police action is to war), I asked the head doctor, “We have plane reservations for Friday. Will I make it?” He answered, solemnly, “I cannot tell the future.”
11. Hernia. Really painful but ultimately of no consequence.
12. Peripheral neuropathy. Feet tingly and in pain, and, the worst, uncontrollable itching. Don’t know how long this has been going on, but I recently discovered gabapentin, a miracle drug, so that’s better.
13. Ah, the latest. It turns out that I have severe obstructive sleep apnea. This seems to have come on recently. I can fall asleep within minutes if I’m reading, and I’m exhausted all the time. I asked, “What’s the worst case scenario?” She shook her head and said, “I’m not going down that rabbit hole.” Oh. Well, thanks. Then she said, “Now don’t go getting anxious on me.” Hahahahahaha.
I think this has been my longest post. Good Christ. And I didn’t even mention the hiatal hernia, which provides me hours of the joy of heartburn that feels like angina but resolves in enormous burps. Or the tennis elbow, which a guy whose name sounded like Dr. Bonestab worked a huge needle around and around in my elbow. I asked if it was going to hurt, and he said, “George, it’s a needle.”
Please, if anyone else has had it worse, tell me? It would be a kindness. Also, no one comments here. You’re making me lonely. Post a comment! It can be anonymous.
Coming next! A review of a great biography of James K. Polk’s wife. She belonged in a much later world and helped make it happen. Her husband was a real yawn.
Thank you, Jack. I believe such an opus would be heavy on the tubas.
Years ago a friend of mine told me that, whenever her father's friends started talking about their health woes, he'd call it "the organ recital." A pretty good line, I thought at the time. Nowadays I have conversations with my friends and peers that would certainly qualify. But George, you've got the makings of a much broader musical opus. Metaphorically speaking.