Love Needed

Quiet Friend (for whom Politica recently organized the room renovation) is in hospital tonight, having been medevaced home from Mississippi last night. He and Mississippi Friend had gone back to their hometown for Christmas, and what had appeared to be some discomfort from a pre-bone-marrow-transplant-spinal-tap blossomed into increasingly painful and complex symptoms. So they ended up on a private plane back to the university hospital here.

Things don't look good--although QF has had some moments of lucidity, and may somehow find the strength to fight back whatever is going wrong, whatever that may be, as doctors have not yet figured out what might actually be causing the current crop of problems. But still, they don't look good, and Mississipi Friend is awash in hopes and feelings. Quiet Friend has been through a lot, medically, in the past seven years, and between the cancers he seems to be prone to, and the cumulative effects of chemo over time, he may simply be worn out. For all he's gone through, this is the first I've seen him looking truly sick. Tired before, fiercely scarred after the brain tumor, but never sick. He looks far away sick, like he's just withdrawn into his body which is busy trying to do what it can.

Politica spent the night at the hospital with him, so that Mississippi Friend could get some sleep. Friends took Curious Girl to a New Year's Eve party so I could slip down to the hospital and sit with them a while. Mississippi Friend is a wonderful friend, and there were a small group of us at the hospital, and more people are coming in from out of town tomorrow. Politica is planning to go a-sabbaticalling on Friday, to somewhere far away for a while. She's wrung out, not sure how she can leave someone who's close as family to us, knowing she has to be doing things with other people in a faraway place next Monday. Mississippi Friend is tired, full of emotions, fears, hopes, grief. She still gets indignant about the fact that the universe just isn't fair. It should be fair, she thinks. It's supposed to be. But it's so clearly not.

We could use some more love in the universe. So could you toss some out for us? I'll collect it for my friends, and share it with all of you.