Things fall apart

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As it turns out, Leah and I are the things that are falling apart.

Leah has continuing issues with pain; balance; and, I’m sorry to report, cognition. She has what is apparently a stress fracture in her right heel. I say “apparently” because when the medical people ask how it happened, we can’t point to a particular time, place, and event. They say, “Aha! Its a stress fracture,” because those can happen over time from overuse, or unconditioned use. In any case, her right heel, or driving heel, is fractured and it hurts, strangely enough, in places other than her heel. The orthopedist thinks she has some nerve disfunction that is preventing her heel from hurting as much as it should. As a result, she is using it more than she should.

The doctor also says the bone in her heel has apparently lost some density. He suspects she may have osteoporosis in other bones as well.

This was on top of her chronic pain from arthritis and some residual pain from her pinched nerve and the subsequent surgery to correct it.

The balance problem has been increasing for months. She is falling fairly often now, usually on her left side. She scrapes the skin off of her arm, and just about the time it has healed, she falls and scrapes more skin off. She is supposed to use a walker, but she usually leaves it some other place.

That is partly the result of her cognitive decline. Her memory is fading fast. She remembers things that did not happen, and doesn’t remember things that did happen. She asks the same question several times, minutes apart. I will tell her something (I hesitate to use the word “explain”) and she responds with, “You used to be able to explain things so that I could understand.” When we watch a television show, she has trouble following the plot and remembering the characters. It’s getting harder for her to find something that she is interested in. One of the worst parts of this is that she is aware of the decline.

The center cannot hold.

Only in this case, the problem is that the center is holding all too well. A couple of months ago I started noticing an annoying after-image in my right eye when I blinked. It got worse, and my vision started to blur. I made an appointment with my eye doctor, and he did some imaging that showed a distortion in the macula. He referred me to a retina specialist, who told me I have vitreomacular traction (let’s call that VMT). That means that the vitreous (people in the eye business use the word as a noun. I can’t help seeing it as an adjective, as in “vitreous gel,” the clear fluid in the eye. But, as I was saying, ) shrinks and doesn’t let go of the macula like it should. They (mainly google) tell me that the vitreous shrinks as we age, normally without symptoms or harm, but in some cases, it refuses to let go of the macula, with which it has been in intimate contact for many years. When that happens, it pulls the macula away from its proper position, causing visual distortion, blind spots, and eventually tears in the macula. The tears may actually be responsible for the blind spots; Google is silent on that issue. I now have a blind spot in the exact place that normally has the highest resolution. You know, the part you read with.

I have eye surgery scheduled for October 5 in Chattanooga, TN, about an hour and a half away from our home, depending on traffic. It would be hard enough if it were in our town, since Leah is not driving now. I am expecting to be gone a minimum of five hours, possibly more. Leah can’t drive now, possibly ever again, and I cannot leave her alone that long. Even if I could, she can’t handle Zoe, our big dog, and I will need someone to drive me home, and then back to Chattanooga again the next day for a post-op checkup.

My aunt has found a friend of her son who says he can drive me. He will soon learn that he will be driving Leah and two dogs as well. That’s the only solution I can think of to take care of her and the dogs. Fortunately, the weather should be cool enough in October that they can stay in the car for a while. I checked the surgery center on Google Earth, and it looks like there are shaded parking spots.

In addition to my VMT, I have a cataract in my left eye, which is now my good eye, but which used to be my not-good eye. It’s having to do double duty, seeing for itself and filling in the details that my right eye is missing. Unfortunately, the cataract is causing a slight bit of double vision, just enough to be annoying when i’m driving at night. So, soon after I get over the VMT surgery, called a vitrectomy, because they take out the vitreous, I will need cataract surgery. It seems that everyone my age has had cataract surgery, and it’s a breeze.

A vitrectomy is not quite a breeze, but it is a relatively short procedure. The recovery involves maintaining a face-down position for up to a week. That’s because the surgeon will inject a gas bubble into my eye intended to press against the macula and try to convince my body that the macula is supposed to be attached to the back of my eyeball. The gas bubble does no good if it’s pressing against the front of my eye, so I will need to be face down to keep it pressing against the back of my eye. The gas will eventually be absorbed by the body, and the eyeball will be filled with some sort of fluid that the body will generate. We all hope.

Various eye specialists, speaking through Google, tell me that the surgery has a reasonably good success rate. The first time I saw my specialist, he said if the VMT is caught early, surgery is 99 percent successful. The second time I saw him, he said it had an 85 percent success rate. I will not ask him again.

And, of course, success depends on your definition. The result of a successful vitrectomy is a gradual recovery in visual acuity. Although Google refuses to commit to a particular level of recovery, the strong implication is that my vision will never be as good as it was before VMT.

Google also tells me that if a person has VMT in one eye, the probability that they will have it in the other eye is greater than 50 percent.

It’s just barely possible that I have already had VMT in at least one eye, possibly my “good” eye. About two years ago I started noticing the after-image when I blinked. It was annoying but I didn’t worry too much about it. It gradually went away, and I didn’t even notice when it did. Was that VMT? I do not know. All that I know is that it was almost identical to what I experienced with a diagnosed VMT, and that in some cases VMT can spontaneously resolve without surgery.

Health issues are generally depressing. And, as anyone who has dealt with the cognitive decline of a loved one knows, that can also be depressing, and quite stressful. That’s one reason I have not been able to generate enough momentum to actually do anything lately, including write new blog posts. Maybe a few things will come back together in the not-too-distant future. Things not falling apart would be a nice change.

Divisible by five

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My brother Henry died five years ago on the day this posts, April 6. He would be 75 years old now. My mother would be 100, and my father would be 105.

It’s been long enough for me to get used to my family not being here, but I haven’t. I feel like they are somewhere over there, in some reality next door to this one. There has certainly been enough going on in this reality over the last few years to make me think there must be a better one somewhere.

I no longer think to myself that I need to tell one of them about something that has happened, or something I did around the house, or, more important, a question that I would like to get an answer to. That phase ended a while ago, but the need did not.

As Snoopy* once said, “You never miss the water till the well runs dry.”

So here I am, still with a lot of questions that need to be answered. I don’t know whether they would be able to answer them, but at least the questions would be there, out in the open.

By the way, if you are wondering whether you look old, you know the answer when someone sees you walking your dogs and asks you how old you are, and then congratulates you on being able to walk a dog. “Thank you. Still working at your age, eh?”

But here I am, still breathing. There is a bit of cosmetic damage, and some internal parts are not working as well as they once did. My mind seems to work almost as well as it did, let’s say five years ago. But then, maybe I wouldn’t know.

But I was talking about asking questions.

No one warned me that I would get old, and still not be wise. In fact, no one said a god-damned thing about that, and I want to know why. I thought we were supposed to be able to figure things out about life, the universe, and everything when we got this close to the end of it. Was I standing behind the door when wisdom was handed out? Maybe I was looking out the window, daydreaming, and I missed hearing my name called. Maybe they ran out of wisdom; it does seem to be in short supply today.

However it happened, here I am, needing questions answered. There is no one to answer them, and I’ll be damned if I can answer them myself. Is it like that for everyone?

This is the way I think of my family.

I don’t know when this photo was taken. It looks like the early 1990’s, possibly a little earlier than that. I don’t know where I was, or who took the photo.

Maybe that’s the way they look now, in that other reality.

* I’m pretty sure Snoopy said it once, but the only citation I can actually find was Franklin’s grandfather.

A doctor visit

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First things first; so what have the dogs been up to?

Dogs like Cheetos. In fact, I’m pretty sure this dog likes Cheetos more than we do.

Sam likes thumbs from leather gloves. I caught him before he ate the whole thing. I’m not joking about eating it; either he ate the thumb, or he’s really good at hiding stuff.

We had some light snow back in December. Some canid not a domestic dog left its tracks on the road. I suspect a fox. Look at the shadow to Zoe’s left. It’s not Zoe’s shadow. That’s Sam, best known for blue eyes and big, erect ears.

We had some nice days, too, sunny and warm, but not too warm, well suited for lounging for a few minutes. I hardly ever sit down in the grass of our front yard, so Sam was a little concerned. He also wanted pets.

Zoe invited a few Doberman friends over for a friendly game of poker.

Dobermans do not play poker. This is an image generated by an application called wall-e 2, which uses some kind of AI to generate images based on a simple instruction. The instruction for this image was “doberman pinchers playing poker in the style of Normal Rockwell.”

Actually, Zoe does play poker, but for her, poker means “poke her”, which she plays with the cat using her nose.

Speaking of weather (or were we?), something woke me up just at dawn a few days ago and I was able to see the sunrise. It was nice.

I hear that the sun rises almost every day, and often it’s quite picturesque. Maybe some day I will go to bed early enough to get up and see more of them.

Afternoons can offer nice skies, too.

Look at the evidence of wind shear, waves going two different directions. The sky over the parking lot was about all that our local Walmart had to offer, given the continuing supply chain problems.

Oh, about that doctor visit.

I went to my vascular specialist on Thursday of last week to talk about pulmonary embolisms, or blood clots as I don’t like to call them. Since my clots were not explained by any of the normal causes or risk factors, the various physicians I have dealt with have mentioned that cancer often causes blood clots. My vascular specialist repeated that, and added that in 10-to-20 percent of cases of unexplained pulmonary embolisms, cancer is diagnosed within two years.

I went home after that because it seemed like the best place to go. I considered not telling Leah what the doctor said, because I knew she would worry. I was right about that. I told her not to worry, and that, while I was considering potential courses of action should I be diagnosed with cancer, that was not the same thing as worrying. I spoke to my primary care doctor the next day, and he was more reassuring. He said that a cancer that was advanced to the point of causing blood clots would almost certainly be causing other symptoms, of which I had none.

The main concern at this point was that imaging of my chest right after my blood clots had found a nodule in my lung. Doctors said that it was small and did not show some typical features of a cancer, so it was probably benign. But not definitely.

I told Leah that we should hold off on the worrying until I saw the pulmonary specialist on Thursday of this week. I had a CT scan last Friday in preparation for that appointment to see whether the nodule had grown, which would be bad, or was the same, which would be good. The pulmonary specialist told me it had not changed in the six months since the previous CT scan. So, good news. In fact, he said it was probably not really a “nodule” but rather an enlarged lymph node possibly from a past infection, or something.

He said, “You do not have cancer.”

But the mention of an infection causing the enlarged lymph node made me wonder. About 10 years ago I had some heart function problems that were potentially pretty serious. A few months after that was diagnosed, my heart functions had recovered to the point that one of the two cardiologists I had seen discharged me. I asked what had caused my problem and why had it essentially cleared up. The cardiologist said he didn’t know, but that it might have been some kind of infection. So I asked my pulmonary specialist if the enlarged lymph node could have been caused by the same thing that caused my heart problem. He said it certainly could have been.

The doctor wants me to have another CT scan in a year, just to be sure, although the radiologist who read the CT image said there was no need for more imaging.

When I drove back home I felt as if a weight I didn’t realize I had been carrying had been lifted from my shoulder. I felt pretty good. When’s the last time you felt that good after leaving a doctor’s office?

𝕬 π–›π–Žπ–˜π–Žπ–™ 𝖋𝖗𝖔𝖒 𝕾𝖙. π•―π–”π–Œπ–”π–‘π–†π–˜

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β€˜Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, in hopes that St. Dogolas soon would be there; the animals were nestled all snug in their beds… 

Well, it looks like some of us may be stirring.

I see you two.

No peeking. Santa won’t come if you peek.

Yes, Zoe, you’re in your bed, but not asleep.

That’s better, Sam and Zoe, but I think you’re still awake.

Zoe, come on back to bed.

That’s better. I almost believe you’re asleep.

Mollie’s asleep.

I hope she’s not planning to try to snag Santa with those claws.

Now, finally, everyone is in bed and asleep. It’s easier these days with so few of them left with us.

Now, we wait for St. Dogolas.

He’s chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf. I’m sure we’ll see him, if I say so myself.

Will he come to our house before we sleep? Let’s be careful and quiet, not making a peep.

Out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
What to my wondering eyes should appear,

A little old furkid, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Dog.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his leash was all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bundle of Dog Toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a pedler just opening his pack.
His eyesβ€”how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings; then turned with a jerk,

… laying his paw aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle,
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,

β€œ … and to all a good night!”

We here on top of the mountain wish everyone a holiday filled with happiness, rainbows, sun dogs, pink clouds, friends, family, and good cheer.

Randomness

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It’s been a while since I last posted, but, fortunately, not much has been going on. Leah is still having pain issues. I am still here. The dogs are still here. And one cat is still here.

Fall has fallen here. We have had lows in the lower 30’s. Thursday morning it was 39F, a little warmer than the previous night. One of the people I see on my dog walks stopped Thursday morning and told me they had 29F and lots of frost in the valley. Leah still hasn’t quite internalized the temperature workings of a mountain top. It seems counterintuitive, but on the coldest, stillest, clearest nights, it’s not unusual for us to have lows 10F higher than at the base of the mountain.

I have been semi-busy trying to get firewood for colder weather. I was afraid we were going to fall short, but it looks like maybe we won’t. A large hardwood that smells like an oak fell last year down the hill from the house, and has been seasoning in place ever since. I took my old Mule — the Kawasaki type rather than the four-legged type — down to cut some wood. It’s a rough ride down, and a somewhat concerning turnaround because of the slope. Here the Mule is, waiting patiently for me to cut and split some wood.

The photo is a little misleading, because the slope of the hill is not really obvious, but I was pointing the phone camera pretty much level, so, aimed below the Mule. The slope is steep enough that it’s kind of hard to walk on.

There is a stump just below the left rear wheel of the Mule. That was a standing dead tree I cut on Wednesday. The top of the tree got caught in a fork of a nice-size green tree and wouldn’t let the dead tree fall any further. I had to cut the green tree, which I don’t like to do, to get the dead one down. They both resisted, but I managed to get both on the ground. Unfortunately the standing tree had been dead for a while, and was pretty rotten in the middle. The tree I was originally working on has also been dead for a while, but most of its soft, punky wood in in about the outer inch, leaving some nice, hard wood on the inside.

That kind of wood makes me think of my brother, who would have loved to get some of it for his shop.

Here is our current hardwood supply in one of our firewood racks.

It’s nearly half full. There is an empty rack the same size behind it, and a third rack almost filled with pine as well. I don’t like to burn pine, but I was afraid that’s all we would have, so I got some.

I’ll get more Friday, when this should post. Eventually I think I will have to make a new rack for the hardwood, but that’s a problem for another day, one when I actually have a truck to haul material.

I couldn’t get firewood without the Mule. It’s 13 years old, and has done a lot of hard work. It wouldn’t run last summer. I replaced the carburetor twice before I discovered a leaky fuel line coming out of the gas tank. Now it looks pretty rough, but it runs well. I wouldn’t buy a 13-year-old UTV like the Mule, and I wouldn’t sell it either.

But about that Fall. We have several patches of morning glories around the yard, slowly fading away. They’re a messy plant, but I leave them because I like them. Unfortunately, ours don’t have much in the way of blooms. Here is one by the driveway.

That’s my finger pointing at the flower. It probably looks impressive to an ant. And here is one down across the corner from our lot.

Why don’t these grow in our yard?

Speaking of yards, our front yard has been mowed only once this summer. I chose to plant zoysia specifically because it looks good unmowed. It’s deep, probably eight inches at least. Sam is up to his knees in it. Zoe finds it comfortable for a quick nap.

The grass is actually greener than it looks here, but it’s on its way to brown. Once it’s fully browned, I’ll mow it short so next year’s grass won’t have to fight its way up.

And, finally, it’s stinkbug season here. They light on sunny surfaces and window screens, and sometimes they come inside. They are not particularly troublesome, but they are a pest. I was glad to see this on Thursday night.

It’s a granddaddy longlegs eating a stink bug in our garage. Granddad’s body is the short oval on top, and the defunct stinkbug is the longer, horizontal oval on the bottom. I didn’t know granddaddy longlegs preyed on stinkbugs, but now that I do, I’ll be especially careful of them.

And that’s the news from Lavender Mountain.