A few weeks ago Andrew and I celebrated a wedding anniversary. (Our own, actually - but we will be very happy to celebrate yours too if you send us the details...) This year the celebrations were wild - a storm hit Cape Town, and rain lashed the mountainside at our getaway. So we chose the most obvious form of adult indoor entertainment - we played Scrabble. As usual we were pretty evenly matched until that annoying stage when the board is full and all the high scoring letters have finally been pulled from the bag. (Are they weighted slightly more heavily, so that they sink to the bottom of the bag and are pulled out last, do you think?). To get rid of the "Q" I offered the word "QUIT", and I was happy enough with the score. But Husband decided to add an "E", and write another word, turning my quit into QUITE, scoring himself very many points, and a frosty smile from me.
This last week Andrew suggested I bring the Scrabble board with me during visiting hour. He has been in hospital fighting a nasty leg infection. The antibiotics prescribed at A&E and the GP weren't working, so he was admitted to be dripped and prodded and xrayed and checked. It has been quite an ordeal. Andrew does not take illness lying down, except when he is forced to. Now he has no choice, as that leg needs to be elevated, and he needs to rest.
I found it quite scary. There is nothing quite like a hospital ward to help one face the fact that everyone is mortal. It is something that is obvious and everyone knows in the back of their thoughts. But hospitals smell different. There is uncertainty in the air, and the acknowledgement that everything can change from solid to fragile very quickly. Andrew was in the same ward that my Dad died in a few months ago, and that probably added to my feeling of fragility. But the care and service was good, (according to Andrew), with the exception of the food. Nothing new there! In fact if you start to like the hospital food, it might be time to gather the family.
I reckoned that the Scrabble board wouldn't fit on the bed table so I didn't take it when I went to visit. Besides Andrew was in a 4 bed ward, and I didn't think it was a suitable game for a public space. He would have to make do with my scintillating conversations and the books I brought him. It had absolutely nothing to do with my bruising loss last game.
Andrew is back home now, and recovering nicely. We discussed the need for him to possibly give himself a break from the continuous busyness that is his norm. We'll see - old habits are hard to break.
This is the view from the hospital parking area. It struck me as quite beautiful as I sat there one day - the mountain, the greenery, even the traffic - a mixture of the unmovable, the seasons and the flow of life. We are so fortunate with the standard of (private) healthcare in South Africa, and in the beauty of the environment. If we look carefully, and give it some thought, it doesn't take much to move from a desolate feeling to one of understanding and agreement - changing quit into quite.
That's something we can all celebrate. And Craig - you were absolutely right in predicting this blog.😄
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