firecat

= July 10, 1982 (Nine Days Before) =



I sighed and trudged yet again down the Athens General Hospital corridor, my still-unfamiliar stethoscope sliding around where I’d looped it around my uniform collar. Cardiac monitors dinged and glucose IV admin machines beeped from rooms on either side of the hallway. Plastic pill cup in hand, I knocked politely on the door of Room 337, two patient beds, part of my current rotation assignment. Hearing no answer, I stepped in once more and approached the bed on the right. James Samperson. Age 87, diabetic, renal failure, multiple amputee due to circulation shutdown, do not resuscitate order on file. Prescriptions in his chart for Lasix and Digoxin and Lopressor and a few other such medical substances, none of which I’d managed to get him to swallow on my previous visit. Antiseptic whiff of Betadine overlaying a nasty undersmell of terminal organic rot.

“Mr. Samperson?”, I said, peering around the edge of the plastic ceiling-hung privacy curtain. Mr. Samperson hadn’t budged since I’d been here before, still glaring into the empty hospital air above his bed sheets, his dentureless lips pouting. He didn’t acknowledge my presence, let alone confirm his identity, so as per protocols I once again turned the plastic arm band on his wrist to a position where I could read what was printed there. Yep, still him.

I’d thought of attempting to discuss his predicament with him, but the nursing supervisors don’t like us to bring up death and dying if the patient hasn’t done so first. And coming from me, a 23 year old white male nursing student in good health, it could come across as absurd and pretentious: what could I possibly know about how it is for him?

“Mr. Samperson, your doctor prescribed the medications in this cup. And it’s my responsibility to bring them to you and explain what they’re for or answer any questions you’ve got...”

I stepped closer, into his space, watching his face. I spoke more quietly, “Will you take your medications? However you want to do this. I can give them to you one at a time, or all together... I have some of this applesauce, if that makes it easier to go down...?”

Lips compressed into a tight frown, Mr. James Samperson jerked his head an inch to the side, away from me. Then back, and repeat. *Uh uh. No.*







* * *







“I *did* try again. He’s refusing. He’s not incompetent so we can’t make him. It’s not going to make any difference in his outcome. He’s dying. He knows it, his doctor knows it, we know it. It says so in his charts. This floor is where he’s been put to live his last days, and his dignity is all he’s got. He doesn’t want to take the pills.”

Ms. Thompson, my nursing instructor, did a long exhale and stared at me. She snatched the pill cup from my hands and aimed the leading point of her nursing cap in a directional jerk, a familiar signal to follow her back down the hall. She entered 337 and chirped, “Mr. Samperson? Good afternoon, hon. Okay, we’re just going to swallow some pills, all right sweetie? This won’t take but a moment.” She pushed a finger past his tightened lips while pressing the edge of the plastic cup. His mouth opened and Ms. Thompson’s wrist tipped. In went the capsules. “Now let’s drink a little water, dear, so those won’t stick in your throat.” She poured a splash and he swallowed convulsively. “That’s good. Now you can get back to resting and we won’t bother you for awhile.” She looked over at my face. The message on hers was pretty plain: *See, now was that so hard?* “Now you need to get his bed sores treated and give him a bath and get some food into him. You saw what I did.”

“It’s not right to treat him like he’s a child. I’m not comfortable making him do things once he’s refused.”

“Well”, she said, “that’s going to be a problem.”



= July 11, 1982 (Eight Days Before) =





I pressed down on the wet brown mass of tea leaves with the back of the spoon. Additional rivulets of coppery brown concentrated tea ran down through the strainer and into the waiting glass pitcher. I’ve known some people who would wince if they saw me doing this, claiming it was making the brew bitter, but Grandma and Grandpa had been parents during the Great Depression and this was how they wanted it done. You have to squeeze things and get more out of them.

I placed the tea pitcher on the dining table. “Can I do anything else?”

Grandma shook her head. “You go sit down and relax. There ain’t nothin’ else until these sweet potatoes get done. I’m just about to put some of those turnip greens on the stove to reheat and this kitchen don’t have room for more than one person.”

So I went back into the living room to hang out with Grandpa. He was eased back in the broad comfortable blond leather chair that had *always* been his chair, Grandpa’s chair, as far back as I could remember. He was resting now, but had just come in from mowing the lawn about ten minutes ago. Something he officially had no business doing, not since his electrolytes got all messed up and he’d had to be hospitalized. His balance and his strength were still impaired and might never recover, and in theory I was here to take care of him, not just to be a freeloader living in their home. But Grandpa had decided that the handle of the lawnmower was about the same height as the grip of his walker, and would hold him up just fine while he pushed it around the yard.

Grandpa gave me a cheerful nod. He wasn’t a person easily discouraged, not that he’d argue with anyone but you’d turn your back for a moment and he’d be out mowing the lawn. It’s kind of hard to fault a 76 year old diabetic who’d rather behave like he was still alive and kicking than accept limitations.

“How was that? You feel okay?”, I asked him.

“Tolerably well”, he stated. “It’s nice out. And how’re you doing yourself?”

I gave a brief answer that skimmed over the complexity of that particular situation and sat back on the living room couch. Or, as my grandparents would refer to it, the settee.

I’m comfortable with companionable silence or conversation, but after a moment Grandpa leaned forward, rose, and switched on the television and it responded immediately with the cash-register dings and applause of *The Price is Right* so after a gameshow question or two I put on headphones and cued up some Rimsky-Korsakov to drown out the noise.



The phone rang. I didn’t hear it right away over the strains of classical music. Grandma answered it and after a couple minutes called out to me. “Derek, it’s Kate, wanting to talk to you.” ‘Kate’ meaning my mom. Her daughter. I knew what this was about. Okay, let’s get this over with. I accepted the sturdy black Bell Telephone receiver Grandma was offering me.

“Hi, Mama.”

“Hi. Well...? Have you heard anything from them?”

“Yeah. They’re suspending me from the nursing program. Ms. Thompson says if it were up to her, they’d see about letting me finish my clinical rotation at a different hospital, but her colleagues see me as not enough of a team player.”

My Dad’s voice broke in. “You don’t know how sorry I am to hear this. I thought this was working for you, that for once you were going to finish something you had started and get on with your life. Now here we are again, and I just don’t know what to do with you at this point.” I visualized him on the other extension, probably the one in the bedroom while my Mom held the wall phone while seated in the kitchen. Parents with a mission to perform.

“I wish you’d never gotten involved with those people doing drugs”, my Mom sighed. “You used to be such a good student, and so responsible. Now I’m afraid you’ve damaged yourself to the point you can’t do anything any more.”

“That’s unfair! I told you what happened! I do fine in the classroom. I’ve got nearly perfect grades. And my patients like me, Ms. O’Neill used me as an example when she was discussing how to do the daily care, and my chart notes too, even Ms. Dixon says they’re detailed and clear and professional. The only problem is the same as before, I’m not comfortable treating patients like they don’t have any say-so about themselves. Last time it was a woman on postpartum who didn’t want a male nurse examining her episiotomy incision. Both times the nursing instructor said it’s part of the job, so just do it. Well, maybe it’s better to know going in, that I don’t want a job where I push people around!”

“I understand that”, Daddy replied, “but you have to find something! You can’t turn your nose up at everything and say it’s not for you! You’re 23 years old now. Do you realize that when I was that age, I was married and you’d already been born? I was taking on adult responsibility, and you need to do the same!”

Mama chimed in, “We’ve... we keep financing you for school. We paid for you to go to University of Mississippi and you dropped out. We paid for you to go to UNM even though it’s not the school we thought was best for you, and you got yourself kicked out. Now you’re suspended from the nursing program. It’s getting expensive and we’re not exactly getting any return on our investment!”



“That’s not fair either!”, I said, exhaling heavily. “I finished the auto mechanics school, and did my best to get jobs and support myself when I got out. And I didn’t ‘get myself kicked out’ at UNM. They had no right to sign me into that place, I hadn’t done anything to hurt anyone or threaten anyone, it was all a misunderstanding and it wasn’t my fault!”

“Nothing ever is, is it?”

Daddy interceded. “I don’t think it’s productive to talk about blame and fault, that’s not the point. We need to think about what’s next. We’re not giving up on you but we can’t just keep repeating the same things that didn’t work the first time and expecting different results.”

Mama said, “Mother says you’re a real help around the house and you’ve been taking care of your Grandpa a lot better than the home attendants ever did, so you’re pulling your weight, and I’m glad you’re there with them, they need you. But we were so hopeful that you’d turn this into an opportunity and that nursing would suit you. We love you and we want what’s best for you. We’re just frustrated because we don’t know what that is.”


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I'm seeking feedback on my book Within the Box right here, one chapter at a time.

I'm hoping people will read it and comment on it as I go. I'm hoping that if they like it, they'll spread the word.

When I get to the end, I'll start over with the first chapter, by which point I'll no doubt have made changes.

Meanwhile, I'll keep querying lit agents, because why not? But this way I'm not postponing the experience of having readers.



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My first book, GenderQueer: A Story From a Different Closet, is published by Sunstone Press. It is available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble in paperback, hardback, and ebook, and as ebook only from Apple, Kobo, and directly from Sunstone Press themselves.


My second book, That Guy in Our Women's Studies Class, has also now been published by Sunstone Press. It's a sequel to GenderQueer. It is available on Amazon and on Barnes & Noble in paperback and ebook, and as ebook only from Apple, Kobo, and directly from Sunstone Press themselves.




Links to published reviews and comments are listed on my Home Page, for both published books.

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