Sub-terminal

Monday 14 May

Your friend slept soundly for a whole night. Still, she doesn't feel great. Nausea and weakness battle with her desire to discuss the morning's headlines, which include election results in Germany and the "egregious mistake" of 2 billion USD that JP Morgan made. "Oops", Lara commented. Cappuccino takes the edge off, but she doesn't feel great.

When I found her asleep at 7:00AM - and I force myself to own up to it - my impression was one of a sub-terminal patient. Which is what she is. Her face colorless, her skin taut, her lips thin and drawn inward, baring her teeth. Still her breathing was even and deep, fed by 6 liters of oxygen from the machine (concentration at 92%).

"I am dying", she admitted over breakfast, but I am not gone just yet. I want more quality time, she insisted. She will have it. Admittedly, I hover about a lot, but I am not one to suffer other people's sickness bravely. You whisk in and out, says Lara. Which is true. I escape into taking care of her. Then again, we do talk to each other, but find that there is not an awful lot left to say after a long life together and a long illness. We have to draw up a list of items, maybe. You don't want to discover you forgot to ask her about something important.

I have to finish my poem first, said Lara.

Amen to that.

As from today we will skip having a nightly garde-malade, so it will be just Lara and I in the house with a list of emergency numbers to call in case of sinistres as the French
say - in case something goes awry. The ladies will keep coming from 9:00AM to 8:00PM.

Tomorrow will be a busy day. Early rise at 7:00AM to receive the nurse, then breakfast and a 9:30 pick-up by the ambulance. Probably not back from the hospital before 6:30 or 7:00PM.

Around 6:00 today Connie called and wanted to know how I was and then Lara. I passed her through to Lara and Ed joined. They were sorry they couldn't travel all the way over to Brussels to visit her one last time. They both have serious physical impediments.

Ed, as a parting shot, at the end of the phone call said something intriguing: "We will see you in time." An evocative greeting when you think about it.