When I woke up after surgery my right foot had saffron yellow toe nails and was encased in white gauze. They put me up overnight on the 16th floor. That night I was restless with itching, vomiting, and some pain. The nurse said the itching was a side effect of one of the anesthetics. Worst of all, I was often woken up as soon as I managed to fall back to sleep to have my temperature, pulse, and blood pressure monitored.
On Sunday I overdid it. I had breakfast in Starbucks Soi Thong Lo and lunch at Seacon Square, hobbling around with a four-toed cane and refusing to make any concessions to the pain in my foot. By afternoon, the foot began to swell and redden. We went back to the hospital where they called the surgeon. Fortunately he lived nearby so he did not have to fight Sunday traffic as we did. He took off the bandage covering the wound and said, I have to re-admit you. You might have an infection.
They started me on IV antibiotics and gave pain killers as needed. Though the blood test was negative for infection, the surgeon insisted I stay till Tuesday. Besides the poking, prodding, and pumping, the nurses were sometimes spooky. For instance, there was the nurse at the other end of the call button, day and night, who always asked me "Can I hell you?" Another one with the light cold fingers gave me the antibiotics intravenously. I always felt cold afterwards. And the one who never failed to make me laugh, the Nurse of the Body Functions who greeted me cheerfully, "how many pee-pee and poo-poo today?"
By now I had learned to respect the pain in my foot. I avoided putting any weight on it. I practiced hopping from bed to bathroom and back with a walker the nurses lent me. But the nicest part of the second hospital stay was Mimi's carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. It was the best medicine.
On Tuesday morning the surgeon discharged me. Stay off the foot, he ordered, or you might have to come back. I meekly agreed. Life has now become a calculation of distance times access equals getting from Point A to Point B. At home, the step up from the driveway to the porch I estimated was worth a three-inch "hop." We went to the Club tonight but used the back entrance because it has a ramp. I'm also beginning to realize how much of Bangkok is not accessible to people with mobility issues.
At home, Andy and AJ are my legs. On Wednesday, I went back to school. It was nice to have a fuss made over me! I borrowed the school wheelchair and my students wheeled me everywhere. They helped me take down all my bulletin boards because I couldn't reach and couldn't climb, of course. The teachers were so helpful and so kind. I baked a cheesecake on Wednesday night. On Thursday, it was the last day of school, our End of Year Assembly. I managed to hop down four steps so I could be at the foot of the stage to say goodbye to the school. There are four of us teachers leaving and one retiring. We had a pizza and cheesecake party before the students all went home at noon. Before they left, I got them to sign my autograph flag book. Then on Friday, AJ came with me to school to help me finish packing up and clearing out my classroom. He went all over campus getting signatures on my check-out form. He supervised the janitor who packed my car with ten boxes filled with 19 years of teaching. His last stop was at Finance to pick up my check. We turned our backs on RIS/RIST for the last time and drove out of Perfect Place, the moobaan (housing estate) that leads to the main road.
And that's it. There won't be very many more letters from Thailand for a year (I hope). AJ and I are going on to our next adventure: New York City. We will both finish our degrees: his bachelor's at Hunter College and my doctorate at Teachers College.
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