Imprints on My Soul

The keys strike, as on an old-fashioned typewriter, each arm slapping against a blank page, leaving a mark, a letter, that swiftly adheres as the arm tumbles back into the body of the machine, never to be seen anywhere but in your imagination. But, when you look again, there’s a shadow. An imprint.

That’s what this past March and April have been for me. I  know the months existed and that I lived through each day, but the memory is of  an imprint — not the actual living.

In March, I was rushed to the hospital as an emergency patient some three weeks before my scheduled spine surgery. My T12 mid-back vertebrae was fractured and the pieces left me in immobilizing, screaming pain. I dosed myself with so much Tylenol that I poisoned my liver, but that was not discovered until four days after I was admitted to Torrance (Calif.) Memorial Medical Center and one day after I was transported by ambulance to Ronald Regan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles.

On a late Friday evening, during the detoxing of my liver, with me on frustrating and anxiety-provoking bed rest, the doctors and hospital staff found a clean and prepped operating room for my spine surgery.

Seven hours later, I arrived back in bed with rods in my back from vertebrae T11 to L2, held together by various screws. Although there had been fear that I could be paralyzed by a sharp vertebral prong severing my spinal cord, it seemed I would probably walk again. And I do.

But the drugs. Oh, the drugs! I have little memory of anything but that the hospital staff called my room “The Villa” because of its vast view of the Westwood neighborhood rooftops, its sitting and sleeping area for guests and a walled bookcase that held a large television. I also remember the food, which was awful– institutional meat and potatoes.

I don’t remember pain. I don’t remember visitors. I don’t remember conversations. I have no recollection of time – awake or asleep. What I know is that I went from four steps that first morning when I was lifted out of bed to walk in a tight circle at the foot of the bed, to 40 steps one day later. On day three, I walked down the corridor with a nurse and a walker. Four days later, I walked solo, with the nurse standing by. Then it was determined I could go to rehab.

My rehab was at Little Company of Mary Medical Center in San Pedro, Calif. It is a small, very plain facility on the third floor of a small local hospital. I chose that place because its reputation commended it for its care and community-oriented staff, and its proximity to my home on the hill in Palos Verdes, Calif.

I was right in my choice. Little Company was tiny and uncomplicated. The therapy, which extended for almost eight days,  was compassionate but strenuous. I was up and around in no time. The 40 steps I mastered with a walker at Ronald Regan soon blossomed into 400 in a brace (I didn’t want to sit in that wheelchair for a nano-second and the walker made navigating space difficult).

I decided to stand up straight, be mindful and take a chance to walk.   Just walk. Like I walk (but with a nurse constantly at my side). The staff nick-named me “Turbo” in honor of my speedy healing and determination. But I don’t remember much else at Little Company either.

Interestingly, I do remember the food. I thought it tasted like cat food. Ugh! My Hadassah friends and family members knew I wasn’t eating and brought me sushi and deli sandwiches, Mexican seafood dishes, cheerios and my own tea bags.

When I was discharged on the morning of the eighth day, my son Jason went to my local pharmacy to pick up all the meds, primarily three different types of pain killers. The pharmacist cautioned that I should  take only one at a time and spread the three over two-hour intervals.

During my time at Ronald Regan and at the rehab hospital, all three painkillers were given to me simultaneously. A happy cocktail sort of thing. No wonder I have little memory of anything besides imaginary spaceships and sand dunes I could walk right through. I do recall a real live chaplain who I thought was an apparition, even when he brought me Shabbat candles, challah and grape juice on Friday night. I couldn’t get over the crazy idea that I could celebrate Shabbat in a Catholic hospital.

That was my March. All but erased. Then came April at home. Within the month, two friends and my son wound up in the hospital. Jason was on new blood pressure medicine and, on the third day of taking it, his blood pressure fell to 50 over 30. I think that’s pretty close to dead. We thought the blood pressure machine we had at home was broken, so we ordered a new one right away on Amazon. But, In the meantime, he really wasn’t feeling well. He was blacking out, collapsing.

When one of my physical therapy nurses arrived, Jason asked her to check his blood pressure because we thought our monitor was broken. She did. Our monitor was just fine. Jason was really ill. He insisted it would pass. Four hours later, when he realized I couldn’t carry him and he could finally walk, we packed up for Torrance Memorial where just five nights prior we had visited a dear friend, Peter, in the Intensive Care Unit.

Jason was admitted, hooked up to a few intravenous drips and monitored as a critical care patient with failing kidneys and heart problems. What a night. Long story short, he was released the next afternoon when his numbers returned to normal and he was feeling much stronger.

However, our friend Peter passed away after being transported to a board and care facility to spend his final days in hospice care. Less than a week later, we held a funeral. More letters falling off the page.

Our families shared Shabbat dinner with Peter and his wife over the past several years. My son thought of him as a sort of surrogate grandfather. We all loved Peter; his empty place at our table on Friday nights reminds us of what we’re missing. It’s part of the imprint that remains in place of the letter.

As we do, even in grief, we now gather to continue as well as to remember. Life started to return to normal with new letters and thoughts edging their way into memories or just plain routines of living.

One of my routines is Wednesday afternoon mahjong with four close Hadassah friends. We think a little, talk a little, gossip a little and even make a few plans. We hadn’t played in about two months, what with my back problems or me being in the hospital.

So, last week we finally sat down to our tiles and mahjong cards and played the afternoon away. It was me; my friend Margie, who was just widowed; Karen, who is happily busy with her beau; Ellen, who is often my travelling partner and a very good friend; and Rena, who has been battling cancer for years. Like us, Rena is strong and mindful of her needs. She is one of the kindest souls I’ve ever met.

Rena played with us Wednesday and set up for her Thursday game the next day. Come time to play, she tells her husband Irv she’s just not feeling well. She calls a fellow player to come and get the nibbles she had prepared–that they should play at a different house. She’ll have her husband take her to the Urgent Care clinic nearby.

Irv wants her to go to the Emergency Room (ER) at Torrance Memorial, but Rena is not having it. Doesn’t matter. Urgent Care directs her husband to pack her off to the ER after all, where it is discovered she’s had a bowel eruption. Rena has no white cells to fight off any sort of infection. For the past few years, she has been hypersensitive to her needs, sanitizing anything in sight and staying yards away from anyone she doesn’t know. It didn’t matter. She passed away Saturday morning.  Another letter removed. But the imprint still lingers. They all do.

Ronnie is a member of the Hadassah Writers’ Circle, a dynamic and diverse writing group for leaders and members to express their thoughts and feeling about all the things Hadassah does to make the world a better place. It’s where they celebrate their personal Hadassah journeys and share their Jewish values, family traditions and interpretations of Jewish texts. Since 2019, The Hadassah Writers’ Circle has published nearly 500 columns in the Times of Israel Blogs and other Jewish media outlets. Interested? Please contact hwc@hadassah.org.