DAY 18: RUBATO

SEPTEMBER 10, 2022 – (Cont.) On the “work-up” days that preceded my BMT (bone marrow transplant), I noticed patients in various stages of their own procedures. Some of the people looked drawn and frail, as they sat in clinic wheelchairs, waiting for their appointments—blood draws, infusions, provider consults. I worried that one day soon, I’d find myself among these ghostly looking patients, on the mend, presumably, but suffering as they ran their individual marathons.

Today when I entered the clinic for my daily blood draw/lab, I thanked the heavens that except for my five days aboard the “cruise ship” (i.e. hospital stay), I’d never had to ride the elevator; never had to be pushed like a bag of bones in a wheelchair. The numbers I posted today were off the charts—all in a good way. Revealing my results with a whoop and a holler was Lauren (one of the three), who’d supervised my actual transplant and whom I hadn’t seen since. She was as pleased as I with the trajectory.

As Beth and I left the vicinity of the clinic, we saw many Gopher fans on their way to the nearby stadium for today’s football game. Many were adorned in maroon and gold and walked with a festive bounce. I wondered how long it will be before Beth and I can rejoin the world of assemblages—groups as modest as friends in a restaurant or around a backyard fire pit; our granddaughter dancing across our living room, filling our hearts with delight; a cheer-filled crowd at a Twins game; the awe-inspired audience at a concert. I read of the polio emergency announced in New York and am reminded that the “chemo-blast” I received 19 days ago wiped out my own polio immunization—along with all others; I’ll have to wait a year before I can be re-vaccinated for anything, except Covid and flu (each 100 days out). And neither my wife nor I is getting any younger. A year, now, counts much more than it did a decade ago.

Time. We want it to pass quickly, but then again, we want it to stand perfectly still.

Every day at the “Cancer and Encouragement Clinic,” I walk past a grandfather clock. It stands at the edge of a  cubbyhole along a short corridor by the main reception area. While waiting to be called, I prefer to be off my duff and walking, taking full advantage of the spacious layout. My route takes advantage of the corridor, so I pass the clock numerous times.

With its hands frozen at 1:09, the clock’s presence is ironic and incongruous. Its works are completely mechanical, and at least since I first laid eyes on it weeks ago, no one has seen fit to adjust its weights so that the pendulum’s swing can mark off time. The clock isn’t old, but its design is faux-Colonial and thus, it looks entirely out of place in the ever so modern facility, with grand glazing letting in lots of natural light; a sweeping staircase leading from the lobby to the check-in area; and a computerized player-piano in a modern setting with furnishings of contemporary design, surrounded by ubiquitous, flat-screen, informational wall panels.

But I’ve come to view the clock, hands locked in place, as a symbol of our troubled relationship with time—our desire to skip ahead to better, if not idealized, circumstances juxtaposed to our constant loss of the present as it drifts irrevocably into the past.

This morning after my appointments, I took a long walk in the neighborhood. It was my first such outing in many days. Sunbeams led the way, and when they fell upon late summer blossoms in well-tended gardens, I stopped to admire the quiet splendor. Upon each stop, as if caught within the rubato of a Chopin Nocturne, I felt time hesitate. Such moments restore equilibrium to heart and soul.

That grandfather clock, it now seems, out of place and ignored as an anachronism, is telling us something important about the present. (Cont.)

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© 2022 by Eric Nilsson