It has a life of its own this year.

The weekend was spent working on a painting for Don. I threw one out. The second stab at this is not going well. Sometimes I think that the stretch where I painted all of the Roseville Pottery was a fluke. For that brief time, I had it. But since then, every time I’ve tried painting in oils, it’s been a struggle and I’ve usually tossed whatever I was working on.

I’m on hold with the dollhouse until I get the wallpaper and, you guessed it, she hasn’t shipped it yet. I painted the walls and ceilings in the hallways in preparation for wallpapering, but I have to find a pattern I like.

And, of course, the ongoing attempts to find out something about Joe’s status. Thank goodness for the two women that I am communicating with on a separate text chain. We share our frustration and can freely vent about the lack of communication. I wrote Carmel, who is our contact, yesterday asking for more information and tried to explain that having no updates since last Tuesday had become very upsetting for many of us. We just want basic info: is he conscious? is he still on the ECMO machine? how has the hospital classified his condition? I was very polite and expressed my gratitude that she is there for him, by the way.

Anyway, just after I wrote Carmel, we did have an update. He had surgery to remove the ECMO machine, but he’s still on breathing support and she promised to update us when he woke from the anesthesia. That was mid-day yesterday and…we have heard nothing since then.

Then we got chided by the other woman who is there for “bombarding” them with questions. Well, maybe if you communicated more often, that wouldn’t be an issue.

There’s a lot more I could say, but I’ll stop there.

Thank heavens for Don, who lets me talk all of this out, who cares about Joe, and agrees that the lack of communication has been maddening. I also called the hospital, but legally, all they could say was that he was in the critical cardiac care unit.

So that’s where we are.

Stay safe.

Happy Monday.

We haven’t seen one of the girls for a while. I took this picture the day I heard about Joe. Pippa became my comfort doll for the day.

I don’t have a lot to share because I’ve been focused on Joe. There is still no update as to his condition. I went on the text chain and asked about it yesterday morning. Maybe because of that, the communication between members of the chain is better. We’ve introduced ourselves to each other. Several of the members are part of his current church family. One is from the church he used to serve outside of Philadelphia (we met each other years ago.) One is Jan’s dear friend, Carol. His friend from Philadelphia started a second text chain that included Carol and me – perhaps because we’re not people from the church, but in our case, are longtime friends of Joe. Suzy has known him for over 30 years, Carol has known him for over 30 years, and I’ve known him for about 46 years.

That was helpful because I didn’t feel there was a lot of space for us to ask questions on the other chain. Carmel, Joe’s associate at the church, is overwhelmed, I think. Joe does have a niece and she and her husband are in Grand Rapids with him.

But the three of us came to the conclusion that they simply don’t know anything. No information is being withheld. I would presume he’s not conscious and is still on some sort of life support, whether it’s the ECMO machine or something else. It helped me a great deal to chat with these two lovely women throughout the morning yesterday.

Don is there for me when I need to talk about the whole thing, thank God.

But it’s a waiting game right now and frankly, it doesn’t look good.

I did grab some time to do a bit more painting in the hallway areas of the Beacon Hill. It kept me busy.

Don’s big birthday is next week and I’m going to do a little oil painting for him as one of his gifts. I’ll have to say that I’m working on the dollhouse when I’m actually painting a picture of the shed in wintertime.

Stay safe.

Happy Saturday.

Yesterday, my dear friend Joe was admitted to the hospital for a partial robotic nephrectomy. I spoke to him the night before; he was packing a bag, understandably nervous about the operation, and hoping he would only have to stay there one night. His friend, Carmel, was my contact for updates on the surgery, which started around 7:30 am. I was part of an 8 person text group so Carmel could update us all at the same time. The next text asked for prayers because Joe had a “cardiac event” as they started surgery. Resuscitation was in progress. After he was resuscitated, he was put on ECMO, and had a brain scan.

I had to look up ECMO – it stands for Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation. It is an “advanced temporary life-support machine that does the work of the heart and lungs for critically ill patients.” It makes sure the brain continues to receive oxygenated blood.

The next update said that Carmel and Melissa – two of Joe’s friends, he has no living family (correction: he has a niece)  – were trying to make the best decision as to his care and that he was going to be transferred to Butterworth Hospital in Grand Rapids – which is all the way across the state of Michigan from the Detroit area. They apparently have a specialized unit that can give the kind of care that he can’t get locally.

That was about 1:05 pm and we were told they would update us when they knew more.

It’s 8:06 am on Friday and there have been no updates.

I am heartsick for my dear friend. We’ve been friends for over 40 years. Joe, Jan, and I shared a house for about 3 or 4 years. I left to go to grad school. We were extremely close, the three of us. Joe was by Jan’s side last year as she fought a losing battle with pancreatic cancer. And now this, something I never expected would happen during his surgery.

Joe updated me about Jan all the time. I could text or call him and he’d tell me what was happening. If Jan was with us, she would do the same, but Jan has passed away and I only have this one contact. It’s such a powerless feeling. I’m not there, I’m far away, and I want to scream “Please, give me an update!” – which I am just about to do.

Joe is a year and a half younger than me.

From what I’ve heard about ECMO, this is as serious as it gets. And Mere tells me it’s very hard to come back from that kind of life support. It can be done, but what kind of quality of life will he have?

I know nothing more at this time.

Don stayed by my side all day yesterday. And he will today.

Please send out some prayers for my Joe.

I should add that Joe is a church organist, and many of the people on this text chain are people from his church. He is beloved there, so he has lots of support and for that I am grateful.

Stay safe.