Shedim ve'Shualim
"Stop the gurney," Carl gasped at me, as we passed the nurses' station, on his way out of the ward.
The chubby, kindly Orthodox volunteer halted. Carl slowly raised his middle finger and flipped off everyone at the nurses' station.
"Demons and wolves!" he croaked at them, his Hebrew still fully redolent of Pittsfield, Massachusetts. He was being transferred to his rehabilitation facility, where he had been the previous three months. At least he wasn't being sent home to die, I thought, which had been the plan the day before. When I had shown up in the morning, as I'd predicted, the team had already rounded. I had told his wife, Christina, herself a prior head OR nurse, that we need to show up early, like 7 a.m., or we'd miss the planning phase for the day, but she and my mother had talked me out of it. "They're working, they're washing the patients, you don't want to be in the way." I deferred, I being for all intents and purposes a tourist with no understanding of the Israeli health system, but I had been right all along. I got the panicked call at 9 a.m. from Christina that they were planning on transferring him out.
Shit, I thought to myself. A hospital that rounds at 10 a.m.? I wanna fucking work there.
But I don't. My short reimmersion in the charnel house had reminded me of why I had done everything in my power to steer my career clear of hospital work.
By the time we'd arrived, it was 15 minutes shy of the time the driver was to transport him out. The head of the department came to his bedside, having heard that the wife of the formerly illustrious Dr. G_______ had requested his presence. My father and I sat at his bedside, quietly, watching Carl twitch as he slept, his BIPAP machine splinting his mouth open.
"I heard you have questions," he said.
I had been borrowing Christina's phone, as I had no service in Israel, and was reading about mechanical left ventricular assist devices, and how far they had come since I'd had to think about such things, since 2006, when they were scarcely a bridge to a heart transplant.
I took a deep breath. I had been meditating, knowing I can't be angry or there wouldn't be a dialogue, I'd just be seen as another pain in the ass, the way Carl is. But my dad jumped in, in his even-more-heavily accented Hebrew.
"Why are you fucking around? Why is he not on telemetry?" He began rattling off every query I floated past him, but red-faced, angrier even than I, of course, even more accusatorily than I could've mustered.
"I don't know," the head of the department dodged. "I'm not in charge of his case.... it's a money issue.... I don't make that determination..." Dodge, dodge, dodge. I could see the dodges, but it didn't matter. He didn't have any answers, nor was he prepared to try to give any.
Another deep breath. "Dad," I said in English.
"What?" he stopped, his dog-eyes once again softening as he looked at me.
"Shut the fuck up, asshole."
And we both laughed. "This is the respect my son pays me," he said.
As I loaded Carl into the ambulance, acting as his paramedic because they hadn't sent one, he spied my electronic cigarette.
"Give me a hit," he said, in the ambulance.
And I did.
The chubby, kindly Orthodox volunteer halted. Carl slowly raised his middle finger and flipped off everyone at the nurses' station.
"Demons and wolves!" he croaked at them, his Hebrew still fully redolent of Pittsfield, Massachusetts. He was being transferred to his rehabilitation facility, where he had been the previous three months. At least he wasn't being sent home to die, I thought, which had been the plan the day before. When I had shown up in the morning, as I'd predicted, the team had already rounded. I had told his wife, Christina, herself a prior head OR nurse, that we need to show up early, like 7 a.m., or we'd miss the planning phase for the day, but she and my mother had talked me out of it. "They're working, they're washing the patients, you don't want to be in the way." I deferred, I being for all intents and purposes a tourist with no understanding of the Israeli health system, but I had been right all along. I got the panicked call at 9 a.m. from Christina that they were planning on transferring him out.
Shit, I thought to myself. A hospital that rounds at 10 a.m.? I wanna fucking work there.
But I don't. My short reimmersion in the charnel house had reminded me of why I had done everything in my power to steer my career clear of hospital work.
By the time we'd arrived, it was 15 minutes shy of the time the driver was to transport him out. The head of the department came to his bedside, having heard that the wife of the formerly illustrious Dr. G_______ had requested his presence. My father and I sat at his bedside, quietly, watching Carl twitch as he slept, his BIPAP machine splinting his mouth open.
"I heard you have questions," he said.
I had been borrowing Christina's phone, as I had no service in Israel, and was reading about mechanical left ventricular assist devices, and how far they had come since I'd had to think about such things, since 2006, when they were scarcely a bridge to a heart transplant.
I took a deep breath. I had been meditating, knowing I can't be angry or there wouldn't be a dialogue, I'd just be seen as another pain in the ass, the way Carl is. But my dad jumped in, in his even-more-heavily accented Hebrew.
"Why are you fucking around? Why is he not on telemetry?" He began rattling off every query I floated past him, but red-faced, angrier even than I, of course, even more accusatorily than I could've mustered.
"I don't know," the head of the department dodged. "I'm not in charge of his case.... it's a money issue.... I don't make that determination..." Dodge, dodge, dodge. I could see the dodges, but it didn't matter. He didn't have any answers, nor was he prepared to try to give any.
Another deep breath. "Dad," I said in English.
"What?" he stopped, his dog-eyes once again softening as he looked at me.
"Shut the fuck up, asshole."
And we both laughed. "This is the respect my son pays me," he said.
As I loaded Carl into the ambulance, acting as his paramedic because they hadn't sent one, he spied my electronic cigarette.
"Give me a hit," he said, in the ambulance.
And I did.