Home Sweet Home, a day early!

(a few pics of our cute li'l home, a nice change of scenery for Bob, from a hospital setting . . .)

Bob was discharged from the TCU today instead of tomorrow! Yeeeeehaaahhhh!!!! It was at his request—he heard he was going to be getting a roommate, and immediately asked if he could please just be set free today instead of waiting till the morning? Funny . . . Bob used to to like people . . . he called to tell me the news I was on my way to the TCU after work; they still had to fill some prescriptions and finalize his discharge, so I buzzed up to the bank and then to the hospital.

Penny and Jim had been with him during the day and took off for home shortly after I arrived, to get ahead of the rush hour traffic. We had to wait over an hour before Bob was officially discharged; in the meantime, his roommate was moved in, an older gentleman who was here to rehab after knee replacement surgery, I gleaned from the totally unprivate conversation between him and his nurse 155 lbs, 5 feet 8 inches, has not been out of the country in the past three years, is up to date on TB, flu and pneumonia shots . . . yup, heard it all. So much for patient confidentiality in a shared room. . . finally, we were escorted down to the Jeep with a nurse, who bid Bob continued success on his journey . . .

A light rain anointed us while we loaded the truck with Bob's belongings, then Bob in the back, and headed down I94 toward home. The sprinkles morphed into heavy downpour the closer we got to home. Bob slept most of the way, hopefully lulled to sleep by the pattering of rain, the rhythm of wipers. Traffic was thick, so the drive was slow (I don't quite have the traffic patterns figured out yet coming from the west, since most of my rush hour driving has been in the a.m.), so he was able to rest quite a while in the car.

Our fruit trees are in full bloom, and as I pulled into the driveway, we were showered with a fluttering of petals, pale pink and deep fuschia, swirling off the trees, onto the ground. The trees in our yard are lush and green, a turkey strutted across the yard and into the woods. A lovely homecoming greeting . . . I could see Rocco standing alert at the patio door, and as soon as we walked in the door, the dogs started arguing about who would get to greet Bob first. Gaia, even in her old arthritic condition, won with a ferocious, definitive snap. Rocco had to settle for second place, me.

It's so good to have Bob back home. Doggies missed him, I missed him immensely. It's been a

long two weeks that he's been gone . . . the trees are so green, so full already, hostas are filling out . . . I'm hoping that these next few weeks will be so uneventful that I won't have much to write in here. We've got a lot of homework to do—our mission is to work on bulking up Bob's food/nutrition intake, keep an eye on the pain and keep that under control, to get outside as much as we can for walks and other strength/endurance activities, and right now, as important, work on healing and easing his mind along with his body . . .

Bob's been moving kind of tentatively around the house tonight; said it feels strange to be home, like he's out of place, not sure what to do. I told him it's okay, it's been a few weeks since he's been here, and a lot has happened in that time . . . need to take some time to get re-acquainted, re-adjusted, got some things to figure out, work out . . . I haven't grocery shopped in at least two weeks so as a treat (and because it was too late to head out to for groceries), I called in a small Savoy pizza for dinner. Funny how we used to order a large and Bob would polish off a good 1/2 of it . . . when the pizza arrived, it looked pathetically small, like a personal pizza, but between the two of us these days, it was plenty; enough for leftovers, even. Bob spent a good part of the evening organizing his medications, doing laundry, resting. I made him an Ensure ice cream malt after dinner, which he polished of, in spite of saying the pizza filled him up.

As I said, I hope to keep these entries quite lean these next few weeks. Maybe have a guest contributor, for a few entries, if he's feeling up to it. . . surgery is pushed back to the last week of May. Standard protocol for putting a stent in—4-6 weeks of Plavix and aspirin. That, and many surgeons have to be rounded up for the tumor surgery, so lots of schedules have to be coordinated. In the meantime, Bob has a number of pre-op appointments coming up: oncology and cardiology followups, a pre-surgery CT scan, who knows what else.

I really feel this past week has finally put him back on track. I know better than to say it'll be smooth sailing, but at least now I feel a little better armed with names and resources to contact for various services. Bob got amazing care in the TCU—all of his nurses were very compassionate, kind and attentive. The PT and OT staff really tailored his programs to strengthening and endurance for the upcoming surgery; dietary staff did a great job trying to push the food, to up his caloric intake. He even had a few visitors—our friend, Wanda, his uncle Phil and aunt Connie . . . does his spirits good to get those connections to the "outside" world . . .Every time Bob went for a walk, someone stopped him in the hall and told him how great he was looking, how far he'd already come in such a short time. Even people who didn't work directly with Bob told him this, and I have to agree. I've seen many glimmers of my "old" Bob back—more energy, stronger voice, glimpses of his ol' take-charge attitude. All good signs . . .

He's sleeping soundly now on the sofa, and my eyes are having a helluva time staying open, so time to close again. Peace, love, and home sweet home, all! Love!