Some Tuesday

Write and re-write, just start, just sit, just WRITE.  Don't pay attention to the small voice behind the curtain or the one in your mind, they say.  Who are the they?  Writers, published writers, the two constants that I kept hearing.  Don't stop writing and don't start listening.  I had it backwards.  I didn't start writing and I didn't stop listening.  No bueno.

Princess P(r)auper, perhaps I should explain; but they, again the writers and the doers, say don't tell but show.  So I wrote a little.  Or I wrote a lot, but I will share a little.  A rewrite is inevitable and it too will be shared.  My strength lies in short stories, more so even in essays.  Pieces of my life, snapshots captured, collaged together in one place so I can keep track.  So I can keep writing and not listening.  My story, my shorts, my essays of me and this silly life that I believe to be so important. 
Years now I have tried to let go of my ego.  I have heard it is a fatal flaw.  But I want to write my story.  In order for me to think there is a story I have to have enough of an ego to believe that it is worth sharing.  The ultimate mindf*#! for this girl.  But I have finally gotten it.  I must stop listening and I must start writing. 

So here is today's small contribution to this story that will show how I became me.

 It was a Tuesday.  The day it happened and the day I found out.  Except there were 6 individual days between.  One hundred and forty-four sweet hours of blissful ignorance fueled by percocet. Thanks to the sinus surgery I had to have because the three before had worked so well <sarcasm>.  Thanksgiving was the Thursday between.  Too much Percocet, too little Turkey, or maybe it was the universe preparing me; means don’t matter but I was sick.  Those days a haze. 

I remember the red-faced surgeon showing up an hour late.  45 minutes, that was how long the procedure would be, he told my mom.  I wonder if I danced with her.  Not my mom.  But Kate, I wonder if we danced that day.  I coded in recovery after a 6 hour procedure.  A pierced orbital wall, and 3 litres lighter of blood, I woke up. The left side of my face felt funny, felt as if I couldn’t feel it.  The terror of being paralyzed washed over me.  My bad.  I guess I failed to mention the Italian restaurant and the bottles of wine I relished the night before.  It was just a small procedure.  Wouldn’t they UA me if alcohol was such a big deal prior to surgery?  My mom drank a handle of vodka before open heart surgery.  She was great.  They said it gets worse every generation.

I don’t know if Kate drank the night before too, but I know she drank that Tuesday night.  Her sister told me.  The homework done, and her laundry was folded.  They kept me in the hospital for observation. She got a new phone, forgot to transfer my number.  Maybe she would have called me.  Maybe I would have answered.  Or maybe it had nothing to do with me.