Open Water

My sister called me on Saturday night when she was about to board her plane back to Cincinnati to announce that part of her lip fell off.

Karen had scheduled a flight to Minnesota just before Oliver got RSV. When he was admitted to the hospital on Monday, we counted her timing as perfect as her flight back wasn't until Tuesday night. But an hour before Karen was scheduled to leave for the airport, Oliver became even sicker and had a dangerous respiratory event. She called to cancel her flight, and spent much of her days in room 6480 with us. Michael had to leave town for a work trip on Thursday, and Karen became my roommate for two days.

Let me tell you something about spending days and nights in a hospital. It is the worst possible thing you can do for your skin. To avoid the breeding of bacteria, hospitals keep the circulating air so harshly dry that you nearly begin to shrivel. Despite bathing in lotion daily, the backs of my legs and arms were so chapped that you'd think I had gone for a casual stroll down Chicago Avenue wearing a pair of shorts and a tank-top in the ill winds of January. I should have puchased stock in Chapstick; my lips actually throbbed. But at least mine remained intact, which is more than I can say for Karen.

In one of my mind-numbing daytime-TV viewings during our stay, I was watching an episode of "I Shouldn't Be Alive," a program that showcases people who beat the odds in terrible circumstances. This particular hour was devoted to two open water divers who became lost at sea for over 30 hours. They were severely sunburnt, dehydrated, bleeding, and circled by a hammerhead shark (and oddly enough, left alone by the creature). Towards the end of their plight, their skin had become so tarnished from the harsh ocean water that it literally began falling off. It was so wrinkled and delicate that the smallest brush with debris could cause life-threatening injuries.

At the risk of being too melodramatic, our week had some similarities to this couple's adventure. It was long and arduous, scary and out of our control. We were "circled" by close-calls and near-catastrophies. And that is as far as I'm taking this analogy. Except to add that our skin was falling off, just like theirs. I'm glad to be back on dry land.