last week i didn't work for 6 days straight. it was really nice. my grandma was in the hospital getting her cancerous kidney removed and so i was able to spend a lot of time with her since i wasn't working. a weird thing happened when i went to see her the first day she was there. she was staying in the recovery wing of the hospital and there are these huge windows. she was kind of out of it, and she started naming off all the different family members, in order of age, i'm not sure why. and then after that it was quiet for a long time. i was sitting next to her bed, looking out the window at the spiky criss-crossing tree branches outside and i suddenly had the distinct feeling of having been in exactly that spot before. a hugely sad feeling washed over me.
i have several aunts, but there's one who is my favorite and she was sitting on the other side of my grandma's bed. we've always had random synergetic moments (is that the right word? when you're thinking/feeling the same thing as someone else without trying to, like your energy is blending together into a shared thought?). anyway she looked over at me as i stared out the window and she goes, "you know, that time you were in this hospital for your eye, your room was either this one or the one next to it."
i said, "i remember."
she goes, "it was so sad. your mother didn't come. we didn't know where she was. and they wouldn't let any of us stay the night with you, so we stayed as long as we could, but then we had to leave. we were walking down the hall and you were saying gramma? aunt kathy? aunt amy?"
i said, "you guys didn't even turn around. i was really scared, i didn't understand why you were just leaving me here."
"we couldn't turn around. they wouldn't let us stay, and we just had to leave. i can't believe you remember that. you were only three."
crazy how a smell or a place can take you right back. luckily i don't remember a lot about that ordeal, just being alone there and afraid, and then waking up and looking at those tree branches all day with my good eye.
i got really mad and sad, thinking about my mom and how she was such a fuck-up that she ignored an ordinary case of pink-eye until it was so gross and infected that my whole face was swollen and red, and my eye was bulging from its socket and almost had to be removed. and then to not even come to the hospital to see me? who DOES that? and who gives a little kid back to that kind of mom? arg. crappy.
anyway. that was a bit of a downer tip. but that's what i did this week, hang out in the hospital and get all bummy.
my grandma's gonna be ok! so that's the good news. and i worked last night but nobody was very interesting. except for one super dorky charmer from connecticut.
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