February 13th 2019 Shaving Off Your Beard: Gift for Your 79th birthday 2/13/19

 

Shaving off your beard

Gift for your 79th birthday

           This morning I put away the dishes from the drainer the way you always made order for the day. Last night, though weary I hung up the laundry and did another batch. Laundry was your chore that you did with regularity. I never had to worry about clean dry clothes. You took care of it all. 

     But now out of regular time and normal rhythms like laundry chores you recover in ICU in Cardio Renal at the familiar hospital in the familiar room with the familiar tubes, beeps and sounds. I come to be with you enduring the endless hours as time flips over, no longer doing its job.

      I begin to see the Arc of Recovery as you move off the bed and walk with the physical therapist to do exercises. You eat all of your meals and I feed you. Slowly the mystery of healing takes place.

        The card I made you will find its place at home among the many other cards from other years. I drift sitting next to you remembering the mystical martini party I had for you 4 years ago. I purchased special beautiful blue glass martini glasses and hand made invitations. The only thing was I didn't know how to make martinis! We had so much fun!

         Hospital time is like a Salvador Dali painting where the clocks droop and drip. After a while time becomes irrelevant, but there in the secret places within the body you heal, aided by care, medicine, and the Divine Hand that guides.

      One of my biggest inner chores has been to avoid Catastrophic Thinking and to bind the difficult moments with Trust. My small bouquet of Trust blossomed into a bigger bouquet and  on Valentines day today this is what I bring you with its fragrant elusive scent.

      The day winds on. There is a succession of visits from nurses, doctors and other providers. Often they get caught in our Vortex of Stories. After a while they reluctantly extricate themselves to attend to other patients. It's not easy, but we have fun!

         Toward 5:00 you gaze up at the clock and tell me you want me to shave your beard off. You were born at 5:50 in a truck just south of Buffalo, New York in the town of Angola. You want to be shaved by 5:50 and start over. I rev up the electric shaver I brought from home and start moving across your face. You've got a tough white beard and it takes many passes. I stop many times to blow out and clean the bristles. I shave off this current hospital visit and your many struggles this past month to make it to appointments. I shave off your time on oxygen at home and the effort to do your chores. I shave off the years, other visits to ER too numerous to count and that last visit to Cardio Renal in 2018. I blow those moments into the waste basket and continue. Under your chin it is really tough going, but I persist! Shaving tracks through your beard reminds me of the last lawn mowing we did on Labor Day. I did most of the mowing and you directed me, just as you point out the rough patches now.

     Then we stop and you show me how to take apart the razor. We clean the separate parts. This is the most mundane and most romantic thing we do together on your birthday today. Cleaning out your electric razor together. You show me how to eject the three razor parts and ask for a brush! Why of course I have a brush! I carry my paint brush kit with me everywhere! My brush reaches way down into the gears where we brush out every detail. Detail. That's what you are good at. Details. I float around drawing and musing and philosophizing as you pull me into What Is. So there we are in this moment cleaning the razor. Everything pops right back in and I continue shaving you, smoothing out the rough patches.

       I shave away the years until we are out at our collective country hippie farm. Your tall 7 foot frame is out there scything as you cut a new path in the heat. Wearing shorts, a cloth wrapped round your head you lean into cutting a new path through the tall grasses. Coconut oil glistens on your long frame, keeping the bugs away. Leaning and scything you make your way in the heat of the day.

    The years drop away. Suddenly I am back in the hospital room looking at you. it is 5:40pm now. The shaving is finished in time so you can begin again.