The Blob

Worked from home yesterday. Even though there was nothing unauthorized about it, I have a tough time shaking this background feeling of doing something illicit or cheating. It reminds me of feelings from the past experienced when I was a kid home sick from school. If I watched TV I would sit there thinking, "I shouldn't be seeing this program...I should be in school." The vague sense of guilt and illegitimacy would rob me of any enjoyment. Later, as a teen when I could drive, I sometimes pulled into a parking lot and just sat in the car instead of going to church like I was supposed to be doing. I would keep track of the time and would turn the radio to some religious broadcasting in an attempt to assuage the guilt. I would always wince when I came home and had to respond to the inevitable "How was church?" Unfortunately, it would help develop my skills of lying and subterfuge.
Anyway, I had a full day of being by myself, doing some work but also working on our taxes. Didn't choose to pay Dave this year...why spend $270 when you figure you will owe. Another one of those signposts that pop up on the highway of life...we have no more dependents. On a purely mathematical level that means that $6800 that was there last year to reduce income is no longer there. Yep, sure enough, turned out to owe the feds $222 and the state $38 and hey, Jake, don't be late. My fiscal-headed friends might say, "Way to go, that's perfect...you didn't give the government an interest-free loan this year." Whatever, I'm just glad to be done but I'm not quite. Let my work stew overnight and figure I'll giver er' one more look over to see if I am missing anything. But one thing I know, we are at least $270 ahead of where I would be if would have let Dave be the one who figured this out. (Notwithstanding that Sandi is bound to feel like he would have been able to find a pot of secret deduction stuff that only the Rosicrucian's and the cult of CPA's know about!)
Day took an abrupt turn around 5:30PM...Sandi called to report she was at her folks and Dad wasn't doing well...blood sugar of only 40, unresponsive, sweating profusely. Called back in 5 minutes, "I'm scared, would you come over". Hop in the car, there in 12 minutes. Diabetes, scary thing when it seems to have a mind of it's own and sugar levels bounce around despite best efforts to monitor and control with diet and drugs. Such a bite to be 83, have a number of health issues and then end up with the overlay of diabetes as some kind of diabolical parting gift (as Don Pardo used to say).
Things get stabilized but close call nonetheless...didn't like his color and the labored, gurgling breathing. And of course it's a Friday, try getting a Dr on the phone. Home by 8, finish up taxes (the really suspenseful part where you load all the lines on the form and get to look back in the schedule to see the results....scary stuff). Relax a bit, trying to hydrate as a 14 miler is on my schedule, go to bed, put in the ear plugs (greatest invention for light sleepers) and lay there maybe 10 minutes. Phone rings...Dad's not doing well, need to get him to the ER.
Rush over, kind of wondering about getting him transferred into a vehicle...too weak?
Glad he called it...."Call 911". A nanosecond of family panic and with the push of just 3 phone buttons the emergency response system is ignited. Short time later the cul-de-sac is veritably flooded with red and blue lights...2 squads, firetruck and an ambulance with maybe 8 or 10 responders. Into the house like so many welcome invaders, sort out who is driving in what vehicle and off to United.
I end up alone in the 03',sprightly 260 HP, 6 cylinders, dual exhaust, rolled and pleated head gasket and suddenly a relatively perverse, tension-relieving thought enters my mind...."I'm going to beat them to the hospital".
And so, full of concern and frustration at this fallen world and what aging can become, with only flash thoughts of tickets, how I will explain if pulled over, I head out and have to admit some exhilaration at traversing the no-to-very-light traffic with some impressive rates of speed. Bingo, I beat em'! No victory dance but an interesting little vignette embedded in the midst of a mess.
He's going to be OK...pulmonary edema, drugs, treatment, admission to chase out the fluids.
But there it is in the ER, which we have been to twice in the last few months. A lobby full of waiting family members that paints a picture and depicts a health care system that is somehow supposed to be so grand by world standards but is obviously dysfunctional, broken. The crowd I see there never seems to be a representative cross section of our population. Instead, it's sharply skewed towards the more newly arrived citizenry. Are they just more accident prone? Is the white majority just more careful? Or am I just seeing what one often reads about, the ER's have become the hyper-expensive health care delivery portals of the nation's uninsured.
Well, 4 hours of sleep later, I have done what I set out...just a data dump of random stuff that one Friday in history seemed to bring...no real analysis, conclusions, editorializing, just a dump. And so it lays there, quivering in all it's randomness, as an ill-formed mass reminiscent of one of the first movies that really scared me...1958....The Blob.
14 miles is feeling elusive...take care Rafiki...come for me Aslan! Come!