we all get at least one blogpost of abject desperation

The last two nights I have spent in cold hospital rooms, trying my best to sleep curled in frigid rooms against gauzy, sterile pillows. My presence there had nothing to do with and injury of mine but rather my grandmother’s. Wednesday afternoon I drew my sister out for a late afternoon walk. Strangely, my grandmother had not yet started dinner and it was seven o’clock. Then we saw her in the driveway, sitting on the ground. She had lost her balance and suddenly sat down, her left hip screaming in pain with every moment. She asked me to try to lift her up, and foolish me I did try, but thankfully had little strength. My sense kicked in and I called 911.

Thus began the sequence. Ambulance – emergency room – x-rays (and the wails and face contortions of pain pain pain) – cries for a catheter that fell on irritated and overworked ears of the perpetually unavailable nurses – and the first sleepless night in a cold chair. The next day surgery – a replacement hip socket – ICU – a second sleepless in a cold hospital chair punctuated by hourly doses of medication and blood tests. And it’s over. The worst of it, I hope, is over. If she can walk again and feel useful then she will possibly beat back the looming threat of dementia. If she can still get around and see people, she will shoo away the dogs of depression that nip at her tired legs and weakened heart. I think she will be ok.

Being home I sink into a stupor of lost identity. I’m not who I am anymore and can think of escape as the only recourse for regaining my selfhood. But escape gives me no peace because my absence is always physical. My empty room. That space in the house that will not be changed or filled. All my possessions there. My dad teasing my older sister about moving into one of our rooms and her refusal because those rooms mean that we will come back. The tether is long: it stretches for thousands of miles across states, mountains, and canyons. And it tugs on me and tells me, “You will never escape. You will always belong to place where you cannot be. You can be yourself in other places and talk with other people but you will not belong to them because you will always belong to me.” And I’m snapped back and I stuff myself deeper down to hide, for when I can escape again and unfold my unused voice and my rusty mind. And pretend that I am free and that the tether will not again pull me back. Because obligation is stronger than love. Because obligation is not love. One can coexist with the other but so too can obligation exist without love. Have we confused the two?