Skip to main content

NEEDLES & OLIVES 2

1.
Seven days! Seven days in a high-care unit and the voices have started to get louder and more brazen. 
"You're dying faster "
"You left your son alone at home. Irresponsible mother!"
"What did you think was gonna happen?"
"You work too hard for your abilities!" 

There's a distilled water bottle bubbling soothingly above my head. This keeps the oxygen supply from drying up my nose.
It's sounding less like a pond and more like a damning cauldron. 


2. 
The initial pneumonia infection that brought me here has since been zapped by various antibiotics. What remains are the effects. Lungs are balloons, but that doesn't mean they ought to stay inflated. But not mine, nah ah. Mine got carried away and now their inflated all the way up, making it hard to bring in some new air to, you know, continue breathing. 

3.
A scan, an x-ray, antidepressants and a cocktail of life-keeper pills later, we see the way. 
I need to stay indoors. 
Indoors? Silently. Me? 
Never!
Let's fight, AIR! Not happening!
If I rudeky move away from you while you cough, please understand. I'm fighting with air. It's everywhere. 

Bless. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Not Without My Lola

  Activated charcoal, to bind the poison. Anti-parasite meds. Antibiotics.  Pain killers (on my request). A mineral drip. My baby is in hospital. I cannot see anything beyond Lola. Not yet anyway. She’s still 4 years old. We still have at least 10 more years, no? Her eyes are darting side to side. She’s not responding to anything, not even an ear massage. She’s just laying there, in her cage at the local vet hospital. Lola went from bouncing dog to a drooling mess. We couldn’t find her in the morning. She was discovered facing away from life, while seated on a muddy patch. She struggled to go into the house, and then still faced the wall when she got into my room. A five-minute drive to the vet felt like a mountainous train journey. The vet staff helped us get her to a doctor’s table and she was immediately taken to a “procedure room.” After the longest 30 minutes, it still needed to be clarified what the issue may be. But poisoning is the main suspect. We are in South Africa,...

Clean Girl

  Chapter 1 Fresh.  He always calls me ‘fresh’ and I like it. It makes me feel giddy inside. Giddy? Am I…? No, I don’t know what that feels like. I don’t know if this is it. I’m not sure if I can ask my favourite aunt when she visits. Nevermind, my great aunt is home, and I think this woman can hear my thoughts, so let me sit in front of the TV and watch whatever is there. Our life was very strict, food was always healthy, and having a clean body was viewed as being closer to God. Why did God create sweat if I couldn’t walk around in it? I wondered from a young age. At any rate, asking questions that seemed to question the faith was tantamount to purchasing your own ticket to Satan’s bedside. I don’t like Satan. He’s red and enjoys way too much fire.  We lived in a mixed household, a whole extended family in one place. Life was about piety, accompanied by endless hymns about a better life in another realm. We ate very little, as was required by wha...

Thankful For Loss

1. Don't touch me too hard. Push me when it's needed, but know your power and control your anger. If you push me too hard I will bleed. Not from falling, but from your fingers being pressed a little too hard against my heart's skin.  I have known that heart disease comes with limitations, both physical and mental. It goes without saying that every chronic illness brings with it unspoken psychological strain. I thought of my dad's older brother who looks just like him. That man has suffered from gout for as long as I've known him. I met him when I was 8. I'm in my 40s now. I had my first experience with gout recently. I didn't want to believe it, until physical and chemical tests made it clear. The pain didn't care whether or not I was a believer. After confirmation, my friend François was my first thought. Then my uncle. Is this what this man had suffered all these years? There's no way that can be considered normal. I lasted a few hours before bring...