The Dancer is recovering. I’m hovering. Her apple-sized cyst, wound around a major nerve, arteries, neck muscles, pretty much everything on the road from the brain to the rest of the body; the cyst is gone.
“We saved the nerve,” said Dr. Samant, still in his scrubs as he walked towards me in the waiting room after the uncountable hours of surgery had passed. My certainty, and I am certain of very few things, that this guy was the best, borne out in his smile has he sipped a well deserved Diet Coke on the hottest day of the year and told me what he had done and what that meant for the Dancer, That she still had her smile, still had movement of her left arm, that recovery and physical therapy time was different for everyone but that she was strong.
That night in the hospital room she played Bach for the healing. I left late in a steamy summer thunderstorm roar and came back a few hours later while she was watching the ferocious sun rise over Lake Michigan. An almost full day battling back the same clusterf— ck of administrative nonsense also known as our health care system that had made this a seven month journey from the time the mass in her neck had started setting off alarm bells. A health care system on its way to being fixed—but still needing work. Held together in real life by heroes also called “Nurses” –Andi, Michelle and Margaret–who kept amazing us with their care.
And now home. I hover, she rests, our thanks are overwhelming. God motioning to a Doctor named Scanlon, a surgeon who saved my life at age 13 and now with us in spirit, God saying—I hear all those prayers. Watch this one please. So thanks to those who prayed for the Dancer, Dennis, Suzie, Becky. Maria’s Mom and Dad, my Mom and spirit of my Dad—who I know was watching, our siblings and friends who sent good wishes,my buddy Bruce who made checking in a regular thing, the gorgeous flowers from family in Indianapolis, Cassandre for keeping us fed and fed wonderfully.
This morning we drove for coffee, (going for walks still a goal) wishing we could see Carly at Asado, but still being grateful we could go anywhere. Hesitating, and a little bit worried, about someone staring at the bandages where the drain was or the new scar, so we got a line ready just in case. The Dancer would point at her neck, nod knowingly and say,
“Knife fight. And you should see the other guy.”