"hungry heart"

First things first: My mom is out of the ICU! She was up for a FaceTime this morning. I'm not sure what the recovery looks like, but I'm so glad we can begin it. 

Big A is still not OK. I'm beginning to feel a bit worried because we're no closer to answers than we were when it started. He's scheduled for a few days off, and I hope he manages to shake it off.

Okay. Confession time: I used to come here to jabber journal-style to myself, but now I know so many lovely people here--I didn't want to keep posting bad news day and after day and stressing people out. So I wrote my little notes to myself, but didn't hit publish until today. I hope that's ok.

As it is, so many of you reached out to check in on me... Thank you. Even Engie who's had such a stressful month and is finally on vacation with her bestie. I straight out refused to give her any sad updates.

Pic: If you squint, one of my strawberries looks heart-shaped!

not out of the woods or hospitals yet...

Big A's fever finally broke late last night, but this evening we were back in Urgent Care because he had extreme nausea. 

My mom is doing better but not so well that they're ready to release her from the ICU.

Someone I was talking to said it sounded like the universe was pranking me. I'm not sure if I'm supposed to yell "I give up!" or "Cut it out!"

Pic: The beautiful Monarch I saw on the milkweed out by the mailbox last week.

"unbecoming"

Stuck in a holding pattern today... Amma is stuck in the ICU (she hates it there because she loves company and is only allowed one visitor at a time twice a day); Big A is still holed up in the guest room with his road rash and his high fever.

I had to get out of the the house today. 

I said a fond and proud goodbye to TP, who's leaving Lansing to take up a tenure-track position at Bradley University.* I've known TP since they were a baby scholar and now they have a book out with Rutgers! (*I kept thinking Bradley sounded awfully familiar and only later did I realize it's because that's Sarah's [and Ben's?] alma mater!)

I had to attend a screening of my colleague SS's film Did You Guys Eat at the Broad Museum.

I had to take Max to a vet appointment. (Big A was supposed to, but clearly couldn't).

And then EM picked me up to take me to a "mental-health dinner" at Brody Cafeteria where I ate for the first time today, so I ate three plates of food and three desserts.

Pic: While at The Broad, I checked out Diana Al-Hadid's exhibit "Unbecoming" which plays on the idea of the word as unraveling and also (when applied to women) as inappropriate. This particular piece was titled "Medusa." 

telling everyone I know

I usually don't post very much on FaceBook... But I needed everyone I knew to pull for my mom...

and they really came through.

That's the thing I have to love about Facebook, when you need people, everyone from your fifth-grade best friend to the newly-appointed president of your college shows up for you. 

I'm so grateful for everyone's well wishes, I hope they work for my Amma. 

Pic: Screen-grab from my FB post today

unpredictable

 For a few hours today, things seemed to be okay and I did normal things.

Then Amma got sent back to the ICU.

And... Big A who seemed to be recovering nicely from last week's bicycle crash developed a high fever, tested negative for flu and Covid, and had to make a trip to the E.R. for possible sepsis.

I guess the silver lining is that I fall asleep the minute I lie down because I can't wait to escape this plane. 

Wonder Women

Thank you for the well wishes. Mom is doing better. If she continues to be stable, they'll move her out of the ICU tomorrow. My seventy-nine-year-old mom has chronic heart and lung problems, but as Big A said, she's living to fight another day. 

I nearly died every time the phone rang today, imagining the worst. One branch in my brain's flowchart was already making arrangements to travel to Bangalore. Simultaneously, another branch was completely certain that everything would be alright, how could the world go on without Amma?

I know the day is coming for me, for all of us, and especially people my age. Just this week, I've had friends describe parents as "actively dying" and witnessed (on Facebook) friends whose last parent died describe how it's never old to feel like an orphan. They were not ready. I know I'm not ready. I doubt anyone ever is. 

Anyway, because my sister and I were constantly texting yesterday, I took some strength in thinking of ourselves as Wonder Women. Our group chat name plays with this theme--it's called "Wanda Women" since one of our family names is Wandawasi. 

Pic: Top--our "Wanda Women" Profile photo; Bottom--the photo Big A took the morning they left. Nu is a bonus presence in both.

"in the end I want my heart to be covered in stretch marks"

While my sister spoke to me over the telephone, I spied a smudge on the kitchen counter and assiduously swiped at it clockwise and anti-clockwise with a dishcloth.

I guess I was hearing her words but hadn't yet made sense of what she'd said.

My mom is in the ICU. She may need to go on a ventilator. She may have had a heart attack. All of this still sounds unreal. She was just here two days ago, being her usual self.

Before my sister's call, I had started today's post with this: The gentle, brilliant spoken-word poet Andrea Gibson, who died yesterday, once wrote “In the end I want my heart to be covered in stretch marks.” And I too want to stretch my heart wide with love and what it means to be human and alive and brave. But I can't handle the thought of my mom struggling to breathe.