Titles, Inc.

Pot Luck and Sunshine

An invitation to a backyard party, the first of the season! The early spring weather had been dismal and heavy with rain, but this was scheduled for weeks ahead, and optimism prevailed. With no reason for optimism - after these many glum days could a Sunday near the end of May become brighter? Yes! The sun came out! Oh, did it ever come out. Smack! 87 degrees.

It was a Pot Luck party. Drinks, brats and burgers provided. Requested were hors d’oeuvres, salads, veggies, desserts. I responded that my kitchen has been closed since the children moved out, so I would bring desserts. We made a stop at Trader Joe’s on our way, and filled the cart with packages of sweets I loved, just in case the host said, Oh take the left-overs home.  (He didn’t.)

The sign on the front door said: Party in Back Yard. So we circled to the back, and there were hardy souls baking in the 87 degrees while I beat it into the air-conditioned house. All winter, trudging through the snow with a scarf wrapped around my neck which is burrowed deep into my heavy jacket, I am thinking of this spring day when I can shed it all and embrace the sun. Hey, where are those sweet days of spring you read about in poems?

Several people were inside milling around the groaning board. Which was covered with desserts. So I was among the very many who had retired from cooking! Just two bowls of colorful salads broke up the overwhelming platters of adorned calories. And the dish of hamburgers which were straight off the outdoor grill. As I ate mine, I realized I hadn’t had such a great hamburger since, when?  (Hello Fuddruckers and MacDonald’s). It was thick, it was red, it had runny melted cheese.  Really much better than the desserts, and I know because I tried as many as I could.  

Oh, the company?  Delightful. All newspaper people, some still on staff, too many “retired.”  One man had written the Religion column, and when that was cancelled, they gave him a Sports column which he handled faithfully until that section was sidelined. 

We still get three papers delivered every morning even if we don’t get to read them all, just to keep the circulation up. Art’s a sucker for these phone promotions. He just renewed his subscription to GQ even though it gets stacked on the table with the other magazines that never get out of the plastic mailing wrappers. He feels it is a cheap way to underwrite civilization, as we knew it.

But then the weather cooled, and we all sat outside in the late afternoon sun.  I listened to the murmuring voices, and faced the sun, loving it.

----Florence 

Of Dogs And Books

On entering the house one can’t help noticing the full-size white tepee in the living room.   “Uh, there’s a tepee in the living room?”  She laughs, “The kids use it a lot so we keep it up.”  We go into the dining room to look at the books, the reason for my visit.

When her aunt died, she felt no obligation to continue storing auntie’s books in the attic.  Down came the cartons and then into the dining room where they crammed the floor space.  Books also covered the surface of the dining table and the sideboard. 

It was a large room, with handsome art on the walls.  There was a very large shiny black one, so black I couldn’t discern the art.  The light on the glass was reflecting off the surface and I was intrigued enough to move to examine it from an angle.  Good grief, it was a large screen TV.  The young lady said, “We have a TV in every room.”  I guessed, “You have boys.”  She said, “Three boys and a husband.”  At least they all sup together as advised in the family magazines.

Adding to the space not filled with cartons was this rather large, long haired dog, a Wheaten Terrier, who would not be denied.  He crowded up to me so I gave him the obligatory scratch on his head. 

Then, down to business. I went through the boxes, and as I selected a book, Nancy put it into an empty box.  The rejects of the next box were combined with the first rejects.  It was working just fine, except for the intrusive dog. Exasperated, Nancy demanded, “Sit!”  He touched his tush to the ground momentarily, and was up and huddling with us again.  Annoyed, I looked at him, and shouted, “Sit!”  Boy, did he go down.  And sat.  For a moment, I considered getting myself a dog since they are so responsive to my command.  A very heady feeling. 

I was moving through the books briskly.  Here’s Buddy at my back again.  Thoughtlessly, I reached behind, and scratched him under his chin.  Thrilled, he moved in front and lovingly pressed at me.  And knocked me off my feet.  It seemed slow motion as I floated down, down, to sit into a small half empty box.  Picture a cartoon of the scene - me folded into a box with my legs and arms sticking straight up into the air.  “Are you alright?”  Nancy asked anxiously.  All I felt was embarrassment.  “Fine, fine,” I assured her, and was glad she pulled Buddy out of the room while I tried to disengage myself.  I couldn’t get out of that damn box.  I pulled, and pushed, I tried to tip it over so as to crawl out.  How humiliating!  Of course, I finally got to my feet, so that when Nancy returned I was nonchalantly examining the books again. 

No, I had decided definitely, no, I was not ever, ever going to get a dog.

---Florence

Don't Get Sick

It takes only one bumbling nurse to make you question the excellence of the hospital.  Highland Park Hospital of the NorthShore University HealthSystem is amongst the finest hospitals in the state of Illinois. 

Art went there for his successful hernia surgery.  I spent a lot of time sitting at his bedside reading the papers while he dozed or didn’t.  Here are some random incidents post-operation. 

Nurse K comes in and says to him, “You should sit up a little,” and removes the little oxygen thingy from his nostrils.  She puts her arm behind him, swings his legs over the side of the bed and tugs at him.  He comes halfway up and no further as she pulls hard at him.  I see behind him, stretched taut from the wall, the oxygen tube which is now pressing tight across his neck.  “Stop, stop,” I call, pointing to the cord.  She relaxes her hold and disengages the tubing from around his neck.  Now that he can speak, Art says, “You are strangling me!”  A few minutes later, she leans him back onto the bed. 

He is lying too far from the headboard.  She tells him to push himself back.  Since he has just come out of surgery, he can do nothing.  “Push,” she says. She has to get another nurse and together they pull the sheet he’s on until he’s positioned rightly. 

Suppertime.  Clear broth and Jello on a tray next to his bed.  He looks over at the bowl of hot broth. How was he supposed to get at it if I were not there, I wonder.  I raise the head of the bed.  “Should I feed you?”  Art considers it; there is no alternative.  I try to bring the spoon of liquid up.  I spill as much as I get into his mouth.  Art says, “Spill out the ice from the cup, I’ll drink it from the cup.”  There is no ice in the cup – it has melted to water.  “Have you been using the ice?”  “Yes, my mouth gets so dry, I need it. Oh, I forgot, it’s not ice anymore.”  I said, “Why didn’t you tell the nurse to fill it with ice?  It keeps you from getting dehydrated.”  (Why didn’t she check?)  I transfer the soup to the emptied cup.  Then I hand him the Jello.  Nobody came in to see whether he had managed to feed himself.

The next morning, first day after surgery, I remind him I am having lunch with a visiting friend.  “I’m OK,” he says, “Have a good time.”  My friend and I visit for a while then she drives us to our luncheon destination near the hospital.  I make the mistake of phoning to ask Art how he is doing.  He is frantic.  “My blood pressure is 222/117 and nobody is doing anything.”  “Does your nurse know?”  “I told the nurse who took my blood pressure to tell her.  She hasn’t come in.”  We eat lunch, but we both know I should be at the hospital.  After lunch Ellen said, “Let me drive you to the hospital so you can look in.  I’ll wait at the gift shop.  In a half hour I will drive you home to your car.” 

It was a good plan.  I get to the room and Art says, “Get someone to take my blood pressure.”  I alert a young nurse at the nurse’s station who comes to the room.  Still 222/117.  “Get his nurse,” I say.  We wait.  Art is agitated.  I am agitated.  Nobody shows up.  I go to the nurse’s station.  The young nurse is standing in the doorway chatting with the nurses at their computers.  “Did you tell our nurse?”  She indicates the room, “She’s not here.”  “Go find her,” I snap.  She goes.  I wait.  They walk back, not briskly, I note. 

“His blood pressure is too high.  Shouldn’t you do something about it?” I ask Nurse K.  She says, “He’s so agitated.  If he’d calm down, his blood pressure wouldn’t be so high.”  I say, “No, if his blood pressure wasn’t so high he wouldn’t be so agitated.”  She says, “I have another patient I am with.  It’s an emergency.  I’ll get to him next.”  I ask, “Are you the only nurse who can do anything?  Isn’t there someone else if you are busy?  Another nurse?  A doctor?”  She says, “Do you want me to call his doctor?”  “Yes,” I say, holding hard onto my calm, “Call his doctor.” 

I go back to Art and tell him someone will come to take care of him.  I explain that I am going for my car and will be back within the hour. 

When I come back, yes, someone had administered whatever it is that starts to bring down the blood pressure.  The process has started.  Another nurse came in with a pill the doctor recommended to pull it down faster and to prolong the pressure at its new level. Someone showed up to take an EKG.  Someone came in to check on his blood pressure level again. 

During his stay, I spent as much time as I could in the room as his advocate.  I didn’t trust his care to this careless nurse. 

I’ve been a patient in this hospital.  I had excellent care (although I had a nurse holler at me for going to the bathroom alone.  I asked, “Would you rather I kept waiting for you until I soaked the bed?”  We had a row which got around, really got around, so that surprisingly, she came back to apologize.)

I don’t want to chronicle the rest of the unprofessional lack of attention from this one nurse.  It’s alarming.  Would Art elect to come back to this hospital?  Not on your life.  I mean, not on his.

----Florence