I’m back

By B.L. Azure

A couple of you folks out there - besides my mother-in-law Gladys - may have noticed that my by-line hasn’t been attached to any Char-Koosta News stories for the past three months or so.

The reason for that is related to my physical health, which has been showing signs of age despite my mental health being perennially high-centered in its elder teenage stage.

That mind over matter groove has helped me deal with the constant tick-tock of the clock, which has speeded up and grown louder with each passing year on the planet. But in the High Noon showdown between my physical age and my mentally perceived age, reality won and I ended up in the hospital.

I had not been feeling well for quite sometime prior to my September 21st emergency. That Monday morning I awoke feeling like I had consumed mass quantities of liquid beverages and I was a bit nauseated.

But before I could figure out what was going on I was bent over the toilet vomiting mass quantities of blood into the aquifer. When I straightened up I lost my equilibrium and collapsed on the bathroom floor. My wife, Kim, came to my aid and helped me to the bed then called 911. I once again upchucked large amounts of blood, this time into a plastic garbage bucket next to the bed.

It was then that we decided time was of the essence and went to meet the ambulance instead of waiting for it to come to our house way up Valley Creek.

We eventually met the Arlee Emergency Medical Services ambulance at the North Valley Creek Road-intersect with South Valley Creek Road. Once in the competent hands of the Arlee Emergency Medical Technicians I was stabilized then transferred to St. Patrick Hospital emergency room where I was examined, stabilized further then transferred to the Intensive Care Unit.

Early the following day I was scoped and CAT scanned to see what the heck was going on with my stomach. The scoping and scanning revealed a cancerous tumor in my stomach and emergency surgery was scheduled for that evening.

The surgery went quite well despite forebodings that I had to have a portion of to nearly all of my stomach removed. The surgeon wouldn’t know how much until I was sliced open. When the surgeon said that removing my stomach was a possibility, I noticed the color from my son Zooby’s face pale and he got up and left the surgery preparation room.

“This may be a tad serious,” I thought. No more mass quantities of greasy food would be in my future.

“Do what you gotta do,” I told the surgeon, Dr. Wade Bellamah as I silently said a prayer of thanks to the Creator for the time I have been granted on the planet.

I know I am getting old but Dr. Bellamah looked like he was just out of high school. Nonetheless my future was in his and the assisting medical staff’s hands as well as the Creators - all very competent hands. I was not worried.

I gave the thumbs-up and a peace sign to my loved ones that were peeking in the narrow window of the surgery preparation room as I was wheeled towards the surgery room.

That was the last thing I remembered until I awoke from the sedation. Awoke, sort of. I was under a very heavy pain relief narcotic called dilaudid. And while under the influence of the pain reliever I had some of the wildest dreams ever - some very strange ones, some very spooky ones and some very goofy ones.

I don’t know what I ever did to the people in Charlo but in the opening act of my near weeklong wild dream fest they were all after me, ala the Wicker Man.

I was driving into Charlo from Dixon way and the full moon was peaking over the Mission Mountains so I parked my car, grabbed my camera and started to chase the moon, which kept disappearing behind clouds or the trees. I kept my eye on the moon through my camera lens and followed it but could never quite get it in the clear for a good focused shot.

When I looked down from my eye in the sky I found myself in a part of Charlo that I didn’t recognize.

There was a town celebration of some sort happening on an unfamiliar side street. I quickly joined in the festivities, playing carnival arcade games, watching Indian drag racers popping wheelies on the streets, dancing on a sawdust and peanut shell covered barroom floor, downing brews and jawboning with the locals, some of whom I recognized and others that I didn’t. They were all friendly as the folks in Charlo tend to be but something was amiss. They were too friendly, laughing at all my humorless jokes; amazed by my not so glorious feats of accomplishments and saying how young and prime I looked.

Then they started to change colors; actually their colors took on a fluorescent glow with the accompanying electro-buzz of neon lights. Then they surrounded me and my heartbeat picked up its cadence but I tried not to show that I was getting a bit nervous. So I danced some more and tried to dance out of the human chain that had encircled me, which I eventually did. I continued to hop and skip on down the road looking for my car and escape route back to Dixon but all the folks in Charlo began to shadow me. Each bob and weave I did was met with an instep bob and weave by my entourage.

However unbeknownst to me they were actually leading me like a bulldogging hazer. We soon ended up in a field on the east side of the railroad tracks. Then it all became clear as I gazed upon a straw bale pyramid topped with some sort of cage.

“Bernie gotta go and gotta go soon,” I thought as the young beefy Charlo Viking football players hoisted me upon their shoulders like I had just scored a game-winning touchdown. I got into it, pumping my fist high while I was being taken up the side of the pyramid with the townsfolk chanting while hoisting sticks of fire.

I asked one of the football players what was going on and he told me I was going to be sacrificed in order to have a good harvest in the valley. “Oh geeze! Wake up, wake up, you’re only dreaming,” I screamed through lips that uttered not a sound.

Then I remembered that when I am awake I can run really fast when I am scared. I tried to wake up but I couldn’t. However I was so scared in my dream that I had tossed and turned so violently that some of the intravenous tubes in my neck became disconnected and set off an alarm that summoned the Intensive Care Unit nurse.

She asked me what happened and I said she wouldn’t believe me if I told her. The salty nurse responded that she has heard and seen it all in her career. So I told her and she said that was pretty wild but not uncommon.

I was also in a lot of pain so I pushed the intravenous pain reliever plunger and soon found myself being chased through hills and valleys of Missoula by crash test dummies dressed in Green Bay Packer uniforms.

They didn’t catch me though because I learned how to ski on dirt in those funny little gripper socks they have in hospitals. The Packers soon learned how to ski on dirt too but they had on cleats and that slowed them down just a tad and that was all the daylight I needed to get away.

I escaped to the safety of my old college days’ house on the north side of Missoula, which, much to my surprise had been invaded by India Indian women who were having headless babies all over my living room. There was an India Indian man with them who had a bag full of baby heads that he was screwing on the headless babies. Meanwhile Caucasian Hare Krishna folks danced and chanted in the kitchen while raiding my refrigerator.

It was all too much and I was just about ready to go over the edge when a bunch of cowboys from Charlo came riding up on horses and put the run on my unwanted houseguests.

When the dust settled we sat down and began to chew the fat but I kept looking over my shoulders for the Charlo Viking football team and thinking I should awake but then decided to ride out my dream fest. I had another four or five days of riding ahead and I didn’t know where I was going but I knew it would be interesting if somewhat whacky.

I eventually ended up in Vietnam - again, ending up in a hospital in Ha Noi, really - but that is a whole other adventure.

All in all, I consider myself pretty lucky. The surgeon was able to cut out all of silver-dollar-sized tumor and that left much of my stomach intact. I can’t eat as much as I used to before feeling full but that’s fine with me.

While I was split open from sternum to below the belly button the medical personnel also examined the other organs in my abdomen to see if the cancer had spread, which, thankfully, it hadn’t. I did have some problems with infections and allergies to antibiotics but that has now all cleared up.

Last week the surgeon released me from his care and okayed me to go back to work. So far I am watching what I eat and am being monitored by an oncologist. The prognosis is good and I want to keep it that way because the next time the Green Bay Packers will probably file their cleats and the Charlo Vikings won’t let me go once I am in their grasp.

I do want to thank all those who called, sent cards and flowers, thought about me and stopped in to visit even though I was a bit incoherent at times but that is nothing new. It’s nice to know that people care and that helps immensely in the healing process. It’s good to be back. Thank you and Happy Holidays.

Go Vikings.