New Year, New Shoulder

So, how's your 2012 so far?  Actually, it doesn't really matter how you answer that little trick question: most likely, it's been better than Rhea's mom's.  One week ago last night, she fell at work.  She put her arm out to stop her fall, and broke her shoulder in short order.  Initially, she was told that there wasn't much they could do for it other than put it in a sling and wait for her body to work its healing magic on its own.  That's what they did, only the pain got worse and worse with each passing day.  Flash to today: as I post this, I'm sleepless with anxiety, given that surgery happens in a touch over four hours.  I'll be there to hold Rhea's hand through it; maybe we'll get some sleep next week.

I hate hospitals.  The antiseptic smell immediately reminds me of my mom's bout with diverticulitis a decade and a piece ago.  Without dwelling morbidly on the subject, her disease had advanced to the point where she was essentially given a 50/50 chance of walking out of the hospital alive.  She did, thank God, but that smell always whisks me back there on first lungful.  Just one of life's great grin-and-bear-it moments, I suppose: it hits hard, but not nearly hard enough to keep me away from my loved ones in moments of crisis.

As moments of crisis go, this one isn't nearly what the last couple have been.  Rhea's mom is a two-time cancer survivor, both within the last eight years.  Compared to that, even a horribly painful broken shoulder is...well, it's hardly nothing or a walk in the park, but it is not at all life threatening.  In my book, that's an improvement.

If you would, please take a moment to send a good thought, prayer, whatever you call it down the wire.  We'd all very much appreciate it.  Provided all goes according to plan, regularly scheduled blog service - new content by Wednesday and Sunday of each week - will resume next week.

L to R: Rhea's brother Alan and his wife Kristina, Rhea's mother Andrea and her father Jim, and Rhea's self and I - all feeling quite a bit less pain in Memphis this past October.