FireVaney

Pop spent his 96th birthday in hospital room 4132, recovering from the removal of his gallbladder. His dinner tray came with a frosted cupcake he couldn’t eat. Why? Well, he’s lactose intolerant. That aside, in honor of his birthday, the doctors cancelled the liquid-only diet he’s been on since last Wednesday. Pop’s birthday was yesterday (Sunday). Today is Monday (duh) and I really hope he’ll get to go home. By the way, I learned a new word a few days ago: “sundowning.” According to one of the nurses, this happens when an elderly patient forgets where they are and hallucinates that they are anywhere else. As you might’ve guessed, it often occurs around sunset. Nobody really knows for sure, but it might have something to do with “circadian rhythms.” Supposedly, thanks to “sundowning,” all new hospital rooms are required to have a window. * Last night, in room 4132, Pop kept asking me for the time. Repeatedly, he wanted to know how much “this house cost to rent.” Again and again, he’d ...

Leo took a break from his grandpop’s delirium. Let Betty, the old man’s “lady friend,” play the nurse for the afternoon. Leo, he’d been up every other hour during the night during the past five nights. He’d spent a lot of that time listening to the old man recount and relive any number of hallucinatory and out-of-body experiences.  Leo found himself repeatedly lifting a pile of “branches” that had landed on the old man’s chest. How they all at once crashed through several stories of hospital without anybody taking notice remains a mystery. But once that was done, grandpop would appoint, or re-appoint, Leo to some Board of Trustees involved with endless hostile takeover bids from invisible corporate raiders.  One of the nurses calls it “sundowning.” But Leo’s grandpop doesn’t have dementia. His delirium doesn’t get worse when the sun sets. It gets worse the longer he stays cooped up in a hospital room. Leo thinks it’s more like an acute case of cabin fever. The cure has always ...