Tuesday morning

13 March 2017

— Light frost

Good Morning All,

I can’t read today’s poem without concurrently feeling warmth in my heart and a shiver running down my spine. The speaker talks about the premature birth of her daughter, her “little pilgrim”. Unlike the other new mothers who get to take their newborns home with them after a couple of days, the speaker has to leave without her child and come back the next day to feed her. 

Except that Britta got to stay at the hospital with Holly, while little Johs and I traveled back and forth, the speaker could be Britta herself. Holly was so premature, she hadn’t quite learned yet how to remember to breathe. The first few days she was in an incubator under 24-hour watch. The nurse on duty (God bless all those nurses!) would reach in through one of incubator holes and give Holly’s tiny foot a tickle.

When the docs finally said we could take her home, Britta asked about this breathing business. The doctor suggested Britta and I take turns keeping vigil during the night. I can still recall the look Britta gave the doctor, which basically said she’d have better luck if her husband were Rip Van Winkle. So, her solution was to sleep flat on her back with Holly on her chest, so that Britta was—in effect—reminding Holly to breathe with each breath of her own.  Britta said she never did have to give our little pilgrim a reminding foot tickle.  

I must cut this relatively short today as I have appointment with a new doctor at 10:00. Because of my move, I can no longer go to my old doctor, who was a wonderful fellow who never gave me any schtick about being not quite at my correct weight in relation to my height. By this I mean he never said, “How can a guy six foot three look like a beachball?”

He will not only be a new doctor; he will be a she doctor, by the name of Lotte. This will be at the age of 71 my first experience with a medical examiner of the female persuasion. 

I do not know if I shall mention my dizziness to her, since she will very likely answer something like, “Well, in most cases with people your age, that dizziness is caused by cancer of the ear bones, which in a week or two will spread into your brain and turn you into a large rutabaga."

If I survive the examination, I’ll let you know how it turns out. I just hope she doesn’t ask me to cough or says something like, “Well, okay, now let’s take a look at Uranus.”

Go Well and Stay Well,

Bhekaron

P.S. Lowell, my Apple dashboard says you are on Day-Light Savings time, right? So, if I have not been rushed to the hospital for emergency open heart surgery, I shall be Skype-and-cyber-backgammon ready at 7:00 p.m. my time.

 

Tuesday's Child, Julie Hill Alger - '1927'

All the babies born that Tuesday,

full of grace, went home by Thursday

except for one, my tiny girl

who rushed toward light too soon.

All the Tuesday mothers wheeled

down the corridor in glory,

their arms replete with warm baby;

I carried a potted plant.

I came back the next day and the next,

a visitor with heavy breasts,

to sit and rock the little pilgrim,

nourish her, nourish me.