June 8 – “Sam Day”

Yesterday was a Sam Day for us.  She was scheduled for her second trip to the hospital in League City (Actually Victory Lakes, but that’s a new name that lots of people don’t yet recognize).  No crisis involved, other than the slowly developing one that strikes pretty much all of us as we get to “that certain age.”  Cataract surgery time.  The promise was that she would have better sight than  she has had in years. 

 

Having just done this for act one a few weeks (or has it already been months?) ago, we knew the drill.  Wear a mask (still required in the hospitals).  Check in to sign the paperwork.  Give them my phone number to text updates.  Hurry over to the waiting room.  Wait.  Follow the tech back to the pre-op room, which, by the way, had been moved way to the other side of the hospital.  Sam had to hike the whole distance – not a good thing for her bad knees.  But kudos to her … she made it and even kept her sense of humor the whole way.  They got her all situated in a holding tank room, and on to the next crucial step … wait.  Sam had some things to say about her new temporary digs.  She was in room 28.  Not good enough for her.  She really wanted room 27.  That’s the uniform number of her hero, Jose Altuve.  Sorry, Sam.  Always on the outside looking in, aren’t we?

 

They finally came for her, and I was placed in a secondary waiting room on the second floor.  I texted Chris to come up and join me, but she was disallowed.  They told her there was no second floor waiting room.  Wait.  Then where was I?  And why were there so many new corridors … long corridors?  And just where DID they take Sam?  Oh, she was wearing the same little eye patch thing when she came out, but she did say it felt “differently” that it felt last time.  Could she have received a secret alien implant designed to turn her into a visual spy apparatus for some extra-terrestrial intelligence trying to establish a foothold on our planet?  Or perhaps she was unknowingly recruited by a pseudo-governmental agency in the near future for reconnaissance missions around the world.  Hmm …

 

They did finally wheel her out, and I followed the rolling bed back down the hall and into the recovery room where we … waited.  Actually, we didn’t have to wait long.  The anesthesiologist came in and signed her release papers, and it was just a matter of the nurse completing the charting.  Crossing all the “i’s” and dotting all the “t’s.”  Wait.  I think I have that backwards.  The wheelchair was ready and waiting for her when she finished getting dressed, and the nurse motored her outside, where Chris was waiting (She got too cold inside the building). 

 

From there Sam’s second complaint of the day kicked in full force.  She was starving.  So was Chris.  And since we were right near there anyway, we drove over to Cracker Barrel for some lunch specials all around.  Chris and I had the meatloaf.  Sam selected chicken and dumplings.  Yumm. 

 

Back home we had to keep relatively quiet for the rest of the afternoon.  Sam retired to her room for a nap, and the last time we did this she was out for fourteen hours.  She didn’t quite make fourteen this time, but she did stay in her room until around 7:30.  Chris and I had some of her new-recipe lasagna (thanks, Diane, for the recipe).  Good stuff.  When Sam finally joined us, she finished off her chicken and dumplings leftovers, with the promise that she could have a taste of the lasagna for lunch today.  The Astros winning ways were continuing, so Sam and Chris both bailed on me around the seventh inning to head for bed.  I lasted until the bitter end, though.  4-1 good guys.

 

1 Peter 5:6 says, “Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.”

 

Father, please work to heal Sam’s new eye quickly so she can see again.  Amen.