Chaos and second chances

A month.

Carl has be hospitalized for a month with a head injury and as the month has proceeded, two things have happened. I have had dreams of counting, or trying to count, specific things. Like cards. And other dreams of a world in disorder and disarray. It doesn't seem that these dreams fit with the theory that our nightime fantasies are simply the brain's way of file checking. Mine clearly reflect the relative disorder and uncertainty that now govern my life and Carl's.

Fortunately, today there seems to be progress. He was sitting up and his eyes were open and he squeezed my hand. Still, there seems to be something in his eyes that is wild and fearful. He cannot speak because of a trachea tube, yet his lips move, trying to make words that I cannot read. He can nod in what I think is understanding of my words. And his hands, restrained, sometimes move to scratch an itch, but sometimes to aim at tubes in need of pulling out. I think I would be wild and fearful, too, if I was at that edge of consciousness.

I hope what comes out of this is a way for us to be better together. Better than we have been for some time. I have missed him, a surprise to me because I have for a long time felt being alone would be best for me. Now, I am not so sure.

Chaos, it seems, has turned everything about us upside down and inside out. A second chance is more than many have a shot at. Can we make the best of it? More than ever, I hope so.

A good omen, I suppose for tomorrow, is this: After a day of gray and snow, the sky is in a deep winter-night slate blue; silver clouds, like puffs of velvet, skim across. The chill has turned inside air into drops of moisture on the windows by the front door, making my fingers damp as I press to look out at the midnight sky.

The wind is blowing, but not harshly. And the greyhounds are snoring at the bottom of the bed.

Here's to tomorrow and a better day.