hebdo.over dis-ease?
it’s already two weeks i’ve been sleeping under th bare concrete beam helping support th roof over my cluttered
pie-slice of
a storage room… we moved here th summer after i turned 17. i had given up meat & insisted i wasn’t going back
to san
ignacio- th jesuit prep school- for my senior year so i was preparing for a test on european history to
complete
th requirements for a GED diploma from th puerto rico departement of education…i had expressed a preference
towards
a spherical dome for my mom’s family dream house, & this was taken into consideration w/ th outcome being an
oversized
round concrete bohio- call it a modern native puertorican bungalow?
th contractor had been somewhat negligent, cutting corners here & there (my dad wanted to have this house built
for an
unrealistic $30thou, back in ‘70 or so, & it took a sometime trumpet player from cuba to say he’d bring it in
for just 5thou
above. th realistic bids were between 55-65 thou…) so- we were painting, dyeing doors & closet shelves,
helping dad put up
bookshelf units w/ writing desks in each of our pie-slice rooms for a fair part of that summer of ‘71…there
may have been
bigger unfinished jobs i forget- for example, my dad has been working on sealing th leaky cracks in a
careleessly set
concrete roof ever since then…i remember living on yogurt w/ raisins, wheat germ & honey; & pizza w/ all th
veggie
trimmings from shirley’s, our local parlor.
by september 7 i was on a flight to spain under th care of my dad’s cousin diego, who was a medical student in
santiago de
compostela. a little distance from th bad influences & i would be back on th straight & narrow path in no
time…
but that is, if not a whole other story, at least a very different part of th tale.
fever is gone by now. it subsided slowly over that first week, climbing up to th neighboorhood of
38-39C/100-102F
every night at first. being in dr.dad’s care, i remembered how i had learned to self-medicate at an early age:
if i felt under
th weather & tried to exaggerate my symptoms in order to stay home, my temperature was taken. if i was not
running a fever,
i was given a decongestant spray, maybe some children’s aspirin & written instructions as a reminder on dosage.
der guter
doktor’s protestations to th contrary, attitude & method have changed minimally in 30-40 years…
i brought all th wrong things from vega baja. there was nobody else here to make a salad, & since th vegetable
crisper & fruit
drawers in th fridge are chock full of dr.dad’s mangoes, th chicory was dead of frostbite by th time i had
energy to think of
using it. dr.dad’s food offerings consist mostly of a couple of frozen stews microwaved w/ parts from some
fresh-killed lamb
he got as a gift some months ago. i had some chicken soup of jeanette’s during th first couple of
days. maybe some yogurt. at some point i gathered my strength & mixed th last of th chicken soup w/ some
leftover chick
peas & lamb & put them to boil w/ a fresh onion i had javier fetch from titi elba’s (so when was this? when
did javier drive over?? a week ago last thursday- july 12?) plus one of th wilting carrots i’d managed to
gather…
that’s been my dinner for most of th last ten days- i’ve kept a bottomless pot of lentil soup going since then-
freezing it
overnight, thawing it out & adding whatever fresh veggie it could use a new helping of.
oh, my lymph nodes! i can stand & walk for about ten minutes at a time by now. what was a well-defined golf
ball not quite
half-buried in my thigh is now a squashed, old tennis ball- irregular edges, hardening where i imagine th lymph
nodes are,
softer & tender where there is pus or other liquid debris from what seems a still active infection: skin is
bright red, & th area
is hot w/ localized fever. th only other doctor to come by & see me was dr.dad’s closest friend, th
pathologist mica.
dr.dad is adamant that any puncturing to take a sample for analysis, any attempt at drainage, will result in an
oozing sore that
may take two to seven months to heal. so i’m supposed to be patient & wait until th node (or nodes, may be more
than one
involved) necrotizes: dies inside me & is reabsorbed. i tell you, like a survivor of th bubonic plague.
stay tuned!