Memorial Day 2015 and 2017

Two Years Ago

On Memorial Day, May 25, David returned to Lunder 10. He hadn’t eaten anything for several days and was dehydrated and terribly nauseated. He had no appetite and severe pain in his throat. Dana, our favorite Lunder nurse, who works weekends and holidays, started IV saline and some Ativan, which is very effective for nausea as well as anxiety and insomnia. (I took it briefly during and after my psychiatric hospitalization in 1995). The Ativan knocked him out minutes after it started flowing into his vein.

The infusion room was full, so Dana had set us up in the patient and visitor lounge and taped a "Lounge Closed" sign on the door. It reminded me of May 2014, late in our time at Walter Reed. One night, after David had been there about two months, he couldn’t sleep. We walked down the hall to a lounge and he lay down on the couch. “This feels so good!” he said. The sweet nurse on duty let us stay, even though it was against procedure to have a leukemia patient with a minimal immune system sleep in the lounge. Such a simple pleasure, to get out of bed and nap on a green vinyl couch.

As Dana worked, she said, “I’m trying to keep him out of the emergency department.” She succeeded. Later that day he moved into room 1092.

The next morning, Dr. Fathi discontinued the MEK 162/BYL 719 clinical trial. The drugs weren't lowering the white blood cell count and were probably causing the throat pain, nausea, and lack of appetite. Another failed attempt.

Also on Tuesday, they took a chest x-ray to investigate his hoarse cough and discovered pneumonia. Later, a CT scan showed a large consolidation (not a good thing) in the upper right lung and little dots scattered throughout the lungs.

The previous Friday, R’el, Peter, Xiomara, and Andrew had driven up from NYC for the holiday weekend. Two-year-old Andrew had decided to enjoy his Uncle David’s company, even when his mother wasn’t in the room.

On Saturday, we watched a Captain America movie,Winter Soldier. R’el synchronized the start of the movie with Matt in Chicago and at our house R’el, Peter, and David sat at their laptops (as did Matt in Chicago) and messaged commentary as the movie progressed. David commented afterwards that he missed a bit of the action while typing and reading comments.

Memorial Day 2017

For the second year in a row, Jim and I drove to Charleston, South Carolina, to stay with Jim’s sister Mary and family and attend performances at Spoleto USA. Today we saw Geoff Nuttall and friends in a chamber music concert, including the Mendelssohn Piano Trio in C minor, opus 66.

I wrote about transformative music back in November. It’s an experience I have over and over again. The piano trio players performed with energy and passion. I’m grateful to share the earth with such talented, dedicated human beings.

Also, for the second year in a row, we didn’t visit David’s grave for Memorial Day: we drove to Charleston instead. I was at the cemetery a few weeks ago and straightened the flags flanking his headstone. The grass over his grave is lush and green; my lawn should look so good.

Happy Memorial Day

Right after David was buried, I thought I’d visit the cemetery once a week. It felt disloyal not to. But now I don’t feel the need to go so often, though with the warmer weather, I’ll probably make the 2 ¼ mile walk on the bike path more often.