My Ten Plagues

They say bad things come in threes, but this summer it's been more like tens. The ten plagues. And July isn't over yet. I'm quaking in my flip-flops. Pardon me while I smear some lamb's blood on mine doorpost. Oh wait, I can't; mine doorpost has been shattered by the burglar who kicked in the door.

Hang on. In the beginning...

1) In the beginning the fridge leaked.  A lot. A friend getting rid of her old fridge said we could have it. Hallelujah, we said, and praise the lord. The lord laughed; friend's fridge would not fit through our hallway nor through the back door. Sayonara, friend's fridge. In retrospect, this was so frivolous a trouble that it counts as entertainment.

2) Knowing we were planning to engage in a house-swap in August, exchanging homes with friends from Brighton, we looked at our surroundings with a more critical gaze. The staircases, all three of them, were in a dire state, and husband decided now was the hour to rectify that. We selected a lovely shade of slate grey for the 'step' part of the stairs, and a creamy white for the 'riser'. The tricks involved in getting lines where the two colours meet straight and the paint smooth eluded us, as did those in achieving cooperation from the household pets.

Cat + toy + wet paint = *&^%#

And on top of it all, the stylish slate grey turned out to be more of a muddy brown. We are just not fancy folk. (I tell people that our decorating scheme is shabby chic without the chic.)

3) Then the black cat got sick. The kids call that cat Cottontail, because he has a little dot of white on the end of him, but I call him Bazooka, for his endless destructive activities. In this case, he destroyed our peace of mind and our bank balance, requiring emergency hospitalization and then a series of tests, which were all inconclusive. After the cat endured days on IV fluids and a variety of medication, the vet sent him home to us, undiagnosed, and instructed us to shove drugs down his throat, coax him to eat and drink, and prepare ourselves for the worst. One night we had a power blackout and I found myself feeding my struggling and ungrateful cat disgusting puree through a syringe by candlelight, wondering how I got here.

3a) Husband left town. Not me, just town.

4) They say that Toronto has two seasons: winter and construction. Well, it's not winter. The houses on both sides of us are undergoing noisy renovations. Workers friendly, noise intermittently loud and annoying.

5) Work: now I've got too much of it, but I learned recently that come spring, I'll have too little, as research funds dwindle. Desperately seeking more grant money. Academia is really a life of semi-dignified begging. I sometimes wonder whether I'd be better off brushing up on my juggling skills, learning the banjo, and staking out a street corner with a Starbucks on it.

6) The cat, Bazooka the trouble-maker, took to disappearing. We found him twice on the roof of the single-story extension, which is overlooked by the laundry room, whose window was open wide, rather than its usual 2-inch cat-proof gap. 'Who opened that window?' we all hollered at each other. No one 'fessed up. I postulated silently that the cat was looking for a private place to hide and expire. Then at 4:00 am on Saturday, Jordi the dog began barking in my bedroom, truly, madly, deeply. He was so insistent that instead of shushing him, I leaped up and followed him down the hallway to the laundry room. The sick black cat slunk out, looking guilty as all get-out, and I charged in, flipping on the light. The window was open wide, indeed was opening wider as I watched, the screen flung on the floor, and two tiny hands gripped the edge of one sliding pane. Pressed against the glass on the outside was the hulking shape of a raccoon's haunches, though in that light and at that time, it could also have been a bear's. Well, a cub's. I shoved the window closed, fortunately not taking off any little fingers in the process, and latched it. The dog continued to bark and my heart to pound as I crawled back to bed. That's how the cat had been getting out. Except for the dog, surely we would have had a raccoon invasion. I've had those before, in California, and I felt grateful not to have the experience again. Good dog.

7) I felt less grateful to him Saturday evening. The kids and I had trooped off to see the track and field finals of the Pan Am Games. We had a wonderful time watching relays and high jumps and javelins. We had a less wonderful time coming home, laden with Thai takeaway,  discovering that the house had been burgled, apparently with the willing cooperation of the dog. He despises  raccoons, but loves humans, apparently any humans. Bad dog. We lost laptops and jewelry and some cash. We lost that night's sleep. The police arrived (eventually) and stayed for hours, taking pictures and fingerprints and interviewing neighbours. After they left, a door repairman was sent by the insurance company. He arrived at 4 o'clock am (24 hours exactly after the raccoon) and stayed for an hour, talking steadily to himself. Bless.

8) The sequelae: dealings with police, insurance, security companies, replacing laptops. Decisions, decisions, decisions, and deductibles. So very un-fun. And did I mention husband left town? Oh yes, I did. But I'm not bitter. Not a bit.

9) Terse message from my father: time-sensitive information from UCLA. Prepare to receive. What, Dad? What? I imagined the worst. UCLA has a major medical center; there must be some dire diagnosis on its way. Finally the letter arrives, and it is indeed from the medical center. It's been hacked by cyber-crooks. I am among the 4.8 million people whose patient records may have been compromised. Last time I was a patient at UCLA medical center was over two decades ago. I find it hard to worry, but my father has enrolled me in an identity-protection scheme. I am not that sure I want to keep my identity at this point. Maybe it would be a good thing to let someone else have it for awhile, someone who is better at deciding on alarm installation companies, and who wants to clean up cat vomit. Come on, you hackers, I dare you.

10) The house swap. This is going to be fun. I'm really looking forward to it. I am, honest. I am not, however, looking forward to preparing for it. Clearing up, making things clear. Lists and more lists. When do the bins go out? How many drawers to empty? Where do we keep the lawn mower? Did I mention husband is not here to share the burden? Oh right, I did. I also mentioned that I'm not bitter, not one tiny little bit. I am grace itself.

Well, I've reached ten so I'll stop. To show my good attitude and gratitude,  why don't I list a few blessings. 1) The cat seems to be on the mend. 2) The fridge leakage was repaired for a small (ish) sum by a repairman. 3) The Pan Am Games and associated events have brought joy and delight to the city. 4) Husband and I had a wonderful day at a spa to celebrate our anniversary, the day before he left town (but I won't dwell on that).  5) The weather is beautifully warm, proper summer, just the way I like it: #yesIsweat 6) The raspberry bush is fruiting, tomatoes are ripening, herbs running rampant. 7) The stairs are painted now, and not at all badly, if you don't examine them very closely. 8) Wonderful family and friends have been supportive and helpful about the break-in, and I got to meet and talk to lots of my neighbours because of it. 9) The burglars shut both the front door (where they entered) and the back door (where they left), which ensured the pets did not escape -- though perhaps not for that reason. They made no mess at all and carefully did not steal passports or other documents. As a friend in England wrote, 'Even Canadian burglars are polite!' 10) If I can make it through the next few days, the kids and I will be heading to England, my first visit there in over a year. It's going to be great. I'm quite sure.

There. Even steven.

Forgive me as I scan the skies for locusts. Is that hail falling?

The Postman Always Sings Twice: #Panamania

The Brighton Festival, and the Brighton Fringe, formed an annual highlight to our cultural year when we lived in Hove. In fact, sometimes they were our cultural year. I found out recently that there is a Toronto Fringe, though not, apparently, a matching Toronto Festival, so it's unclear what this Fringe is fringing. Never mind. Husband and I attended a play called Mandelshtam,  performed in the basement of a tiny synagogue near us, and were impressed  http://fringetoronto.com/fringe-festival/shows/mandelshtam/.

At the Pan Am Park

Now the Pan Am Games have come to Toronto, and along with dozens of sports, we also have a panoply of interesting artistic and cultural events under the aegis of 'Panamania'. In fact one such event, the staging of an innovative play called The Postman, happened at the park across the street this very evening. Drama delivered to our doorstep! The kids and I wandered over, dragging our lawn chairs. Husband popped along later, kindly delivering cups of tea. What a perfect way to spend a warm, light Saturday evening.

Finale, with Mrs. Jackson, a descendant-in-law of Albert, seated

The Postman uses words, music, movement and clever costuming to tell the story of Albert Jackson, the first black postman in Canada. Jackson was born into slavery in Delaware, and as a child, youngest of nine, made the journey by Underground Railroad with his mother and siblings to freedom north of the border. They all settled in Toronto.

The play gets performed in different venues around our neighbourhood, sometimes on the front porch of a house that Albert Jackson himself once owned. The music is terrific, the writing wonderful, and the acting engaging. I really hope this play gets a wider showing, as all the performances for Panamania are apparently sold out.

 http://thepostmanwalks.ca/

In Which My Colon and I Offer Thanks to David Sedaris

I'm a David Sedaris groupie. And this week I've had cause to be grateful for it.

Only Mr. Sedaris told me the truth about having a colonoscopy. His essay 'The Happy Place' (in Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls) describes his own experience of the procedure. I don't understand why no one else, those near and dear to  me, bothered passing on such crucial life information. My parents, for instance, explained sex to me in nearly forensic detail, back when I was too young to need it. Perhaps modern parents could amend the lecture and call it 'The Birds and the Bees and Colonoscopies'. Many of my friends and relatives in the US and Canada have undergone the investigation, and no one, not a one, described it as thoroughly as did David Sedaris. The only problem with his rendition is that because it is so funny, my laughter undercut my comprehension. I didn't actually believe much of it. I should have.

***

I got a letter in the mail notifying me that my time had come and I was due for some bowel inspection. My family doctor referred me to a local centre which he said was the High Temple for dealing with all aspects of the gut.  I shall call it God’s Clinic. "That's what they do there, day in and day out," said my doctor. "That's the place to go." I agreed, and shortly had an appointment with a Dr. Moses (not really), who asked me when I'd last had a colonoscopy.

"I don't see it on our records," he said, flipping pages. I confessed that the answer was never.

His glasses nearly fell from his nose. "What? And how old are you?" He looked again, tutted, and said, "At your age! We need to see what's going on up there." 

"I once had a screening test,” I offer, knowing this will be seen as weakness. “My family physician says there's a small but significant chance of perforation..."

"Your doctor is wrong," said Dr. Moses. "It is not significant. The risk is 1 in 3000. I will see you next week." And out he marched, leaving only the whiff of burning bush behind. In the literature given me by the clinic staff, the risk is listed as 1 in 4000. So Dr. Moses may be wrong, too.

***

The eight pages of instructions for preparation look draconian, and indeed, when the time comes to implement them, they are. For four days before the procedure, I am allowed no nuts or seeds or anything that might contain them. No tomatoes, no cucumbers, no strawberries, no blueberries. No watermelon. In summer! It's hard to remember. And ambiguous. Is tomato sauce allowed? To be on the safe side, I scrape it off the chicken parmigiana served at a work lunch.The salad has cucumber in it. No, thank you.

The day before the procedure, the going gets really tough. No solid food; clear liquids only. I learnt afterward that I could have included chicken broth and Jell-O in my diet but instead I subsisted for forty hours on PowerAde, ginger ale, sweet tea, other sugary liquids, and water. I am not a fan of sugary liquids (unless they incorporate vodka or rum). Forty hours felt like forty days. I could definitely have done with some manna. And then worst of all is the purging, aided by the consumption of laxative tablets and four litres of a disgusting electrolyte solution designed to clear the entire gut. Awfulness on top of horribility. For the final two hours, not even liquids are allowed to pass my lips. By the time I got to the clinic I resembled a limp rag, barely able to locomote, and quite unable to be civil to anyone who mattered (ask my husband).

"How are you today?" asked the chirpy receptionist at God’s Clinic, when I staggered in the door, and because she didn't matter, I managed a polite reply. Nonetheless, she understood. “I guess you've been better.”

A nurse, or at least a female in pink scrubs, escorted me to the exam room, where Dr. Moses sat at his desk drinking coffee right in front of me. How could he? It was fromTim Hortons, but still. I sat in the upright wooden chair across from the desk, ignoring the vast plane of the paper-lined table across the room, clinging to dignity until ordered to relinquish it. As I sat down, the doctor rose in response to a summons at the door, and departed. In his absence, one of the nurses (another had appeared) instructed me to climb upon The Table, and I obeyed. When Dr. Moses returned, however, he scolded them. "You can't just jump the gun like that. I have to talk to her," he said. 

"But you talked to her last week," protested the one in pink. 

"Never mind. Sit there!" he said, pointing me at the wooden chair. Obediently, I crossed the linoleum tiles again, perching while the doctor sipped his coffee and looked at a piece of paper. In fifteen seconds he nodded and then said, "Okay, now." And I walked for the final time to the seat of operations. It was a lot of exercise for someone in my condition.

"Oh, has she signed the consent?" one nurse asked the other.

"No," whispered the first. 

"See!" barked the doctor, overhearing. "That's why you can't just rush these things. Put your name here," he said, dropping a clipboard in my lap. I paused to read the several paragraphs above the signature line and one of the nurses huffed noisily. If there's one thing I know, it's consent procedures, so I ignored her. 

"It says here that if I don't want a colonoscopy, I can have an X-ray instead. Would an X-ray do as good a job?" I asked. 

"No," Dr. Moses said. "Not as good." I sign. I’m a researcher; I know consent procedures, but I also know when I'm beaten. All I can do is try to remember this experience next time I’m the one asking for consent.

I have told the doctor, and the nurses, and written on my intake form at the previous visit that I am worried about sedation, that in the past I've had struggles coming out of anaesthesia, and that I think in my case, a little goes a long way. David Sedaris describes the sedative as the best part of the procedure, the route to the 'happy place,' so I don't want to forgo the experience, but I do want to survive it. I suspect that in my current condition a glass of wine would do the same trick as fancy drugs. I remind them again about my worries.

"Yes, yes," says Dr. Moses. “You can tell the anaestheiologist.” Meanwhile he inserts a needle into the back of my hand. "Roll onto your left side." I do so while the nurses work to ensure that my (still clothed) body remains covered by large paper sheets. My back is to the door so I can’t see anyone going through it, but a moment later a man leans over my shoulder and starts pushing an ampoule into the needle in my hand. I never even see the whites of his eyes. I never see anything of him, in fact, but his fingers. I say, as quickly as I can, slightly desperate, "I have concerns about the amount of sedation. I've had experiences before..."

"Why are you waiting until now to say something?" says the bogeyman behind me, irritably. 

"I didn't!" I protest. "I'm not! I told them, I told them all, many times..." I feel myself fading, and I contemplate death. Then I decide this might not be a good last thought, and instead, conjure up David Sedaris. Happy place, happy place. And I'm out.

***

I'm vaguely aware of being prodded into a wheelchair, but don't really come round until I'm lying in a La-Z-Boy in another room. There’s a line of them, in black vinyl, each slightly torn or scuffed, each with a vital-signs monitor beeping next to it. Without the monitors, it could have been a beauty parlor. I have a cuff on my right arm and a clip on my middle finger, and my machine is beeping too. I feel fine, pleasantly sleepy, and cold. A nurse reads my mind and puts a blanket over me. Is this the happy place?

Dr. Moses comes in holding a battered leather briefcase and wiggles my stockinged toes. “All good!” he says, cheerily. “See you in 10 years. Bye.” He disappears out the door, down the corridor. I drift off.

***

As I gradually awake, I have questions. Can I eat now? Drink? Yes. The nurse helpfully fishes out the travel mug I brought with hot sweet milky tea.  Why is my blood pressure varying? The nurse says she is not sure, but is not too worried; for the next few days, she suggests, I should go to Shoppers, a local drugstore chain, and check it again. I heard her give the same advice to the woman next to me and was not impressed.

I ask the nurse whether I can consult with a doctor about my blood pressure. Moses has gone but I know there is a doctor about the place, a thin man with white hair, white skin, and pale eyes. He made me think of skim milk. Earlier, I had watched him speak to a patient in another La-Z-Boy, a woman looking smarter than most of us, in a print wrap skirt, high-heeled sandals, and a neat chin-length bob. The milky doctor had rested both his hands on her bare shins and said “I bet you do a lot of walking.” 

The nurse fetches him. I see from stitching on his white coat that he is, in fact, Dr. God, the head honcho. In response to my query he says “Oh, it’s just nerves. You're a woman. You see, I'm married so I know all about you girls.”   I tell him he is lucky he didn't say so at a conference in South Korea, but apparently he has not followed the #TimHunt news. I ask when I can resume exercise.

“Two days,” says Dr. God.

“So I can play soccer the day after tomorrow?” I ask.

“Sure. Well, it depends. Do you know how to play soccer?”  Cute.

“Yeah, yeah. And doctor will I be able to play piano afterward,” I respond.

He takes this as humour. Fine, let him. “She's sharp, this one,” he says to the nurse. Annoyed would be closer.

Husband is in the waiting room, ready to escort me home. I’m a little slow, a little fuzzy, nowhere near as happy as David S. promised. (I knew I shouldn’t believe everything he said.) What I am mainly is starving, so we stop in the deli downstairs for a sandwich, which goes a long way toward waking me up. Within an hour, I’m feeling fine, and we head off to collect daughter from her friend’s house.  “Don’t turn left here. Take the next street,” I instruct. “Watch the pedestrian!” I’ve signed an agreement that I won’t drive for the next 24 hours.

“You’ve recovered,” sighs my husband, resigned.

***

David Sedaris lives in England but had his colonoscopy while he was visiting the US. According to the NHS, bowel cancer screening is recommended to people between the ages of 60 and 74, and by ‘screening’, they mean sending off a stool sample to a lab. If the sample is abnormal, only then does the NHS offer a colonoscopy-- eventually. Meanwhile, in Ontario, it seems, everyone over 50 gets a colonoscopy right off the bat (although the webpage for the Cancer Society of Canada says that ideally, the lab test should be offered first).

Does it make a difference, this widespread deployment of invasive investigation? I sure don’t know. There are lies, damned lies, and statistics, and the interweb has all of them ready for me. Five-year colon cancer survival rates are ever so slightly higher in Canada than they are in England, by about two percentage points. I don’t know the data and have no information about how the calculations were done or on what population.  I do know that googling ‘bowel cancer survival rates UK’ led me, at very first go, to an immaculate, easy-to-read table¹. Doing the same for Canada took me to pages within pages of text before I located a cautiously-worded rendition of (possibly) comparable information².

About the behind, Canada seems less up-front.

***

The ever-ready net tells me that, in fact, it’s perfectly okay to exercise the day after an uncomplicated colonoscopy, so I allow myself an easy bike ride and a Pilates session. I find myself looking at other people in the class, and wondering. Has she had one? Has he? We need a secret sign. “Arms out, and squat,” says the instructor.

That could be it.

1.        http://www.cancerresearchuk.org/health-professional/cancer-statistics/statistics-by-cancer-type/bowel-cancer/survival#heading-Zero

2.        http://www.cancerview.ca/idc/groups/public/documents/webcontent/rl_crc_snapshot_three_en.pdf

Beware Canucks on Wheels

I've noted in previous posts that Canadians, by and large, do indeed tend toward courtesy and politeness, in accord with their international reputation. But there is a glaring exception: Canadians operating wheeled vehicles. (Possibly unwheeled ones, too; I haven't had enough experience with boats or Skidoos* to generalize further.) Give Canadians a car, a bicycle, a motorcycle, or a truck, and they too easily switch from polite Dr. Jekylls to wild Mr. Hydes. Yes, even cyclists; they can be horrible to cars, pedestrians, and each other. Lately I notice that my tweets (@lectoronto) are all about safety on the streets. I started composing a Cyclists' Manifesto. Rule No. 1: 'If thou chooseth to ride the wrong way on one-way streets [and occasionally, I acknowledge, it is best], thou shalt give way to everyone and everything else: cars, bikes, pedestrians, cats, even insects. And thou shalt stop at every single intersection even though there is no stop sign facing thee (because thou art going the wrong way, ding-dong)'. I've become a real Disgusted of Harbord Village.


I espouse the 'go slow, be nice' philosophy of road use and try very hard to obey it, too, but the provocation is such that I often fail. A few weeks ago, en route by bike to collect daughter at school, a man with a stretched face and a ragged grey beard driving a silver tin can of a hatchback shouted at me. 'Stop, you dumb bitch,' he said, and, without indicating, drove across my path and turned left. Full of outrage, I gave chase, but he got away. Upon reflection I felt less upset at the 'bitch' part of the comment than at the 'dumb'. How dare he. 

In the last day or two, I've had several near misses on bike and on foot, involving drivers of trucks, cars, and bikes. The nice thing is that in summer, with windows rolled down, I can offer my feedback live and on the spot, as well as venting via tweets to @bikeTO or #cycleToronto. For example, yesterday, riding along wearing my day-glo lime-green jacket, I could ask the reversing truck driver whether I wasn't bright enough for him to see me. 'I saw you,' he admitted. I guess he just didn't think I would make much of a dent in his rear bumper.

As my eldest child takes more and more to using two wheels to get around town, I am both delighted and fearful. 'Be careful. Trust no one,' I counsel him. Especially not Torontonians on wheels. 

Go slow, be nice.

Deep breaths.

Ommm. 

The man in the silver tin can, by the way, had Ontario license plates beginning with the letter A. If you spot him, please tell him from me that he's a ding-dong.

*Canadian for 'snowmobile'