So here I yam, starting to get my dainty self prepped for the dramatic surgery I get to enjoy next week. My Mastectomy Buddy went in yesterday…and I hope to hear from her in a day or two.
Her adventure is even more dramatic, because she has an actual invasive cancer. Thank the Lord (or Lady), I managed to escape that. Her mastectomy: pretty much de rigueur. Mine: pretty much a matter of smarts.
So we’re keeping her in our thoughts.
And we’re also keeping another Dear Friend in our thoughts: as I was driving into the ‘hood yesterday afternoon I spotted her strolling up the road with her big, friendly, lop-eared dog. Her husband has been enjoying lung cancer these past many months. She looked tired, even haggard. I stopped to block traffic and chat. She said they had hospice in. Called their son, who’s on his way in from out of town. Hospice worker was amazed the old boy made it through the holidays. She says he sleeps most of the time.
God, please let us sleep through the dark of that good night.
So where were we? Yes. We were thanking our lucky stars, because things could be worse. Much, much worse.
This afternoon, with barely a week that’s not occupied by holidays and parade road closures to go, I decided I’d better get my act together.
Insights:
1) One can order the desired peri-surgical gear from Amazon and waypoints rather than running around the city searching for recommended items.
2) One could, in theory (only in theory, right?) stock up one’s favorite boozie-poos and open the bottles. These, then would be ready to go without any painful struggles.
We’re told that for the first three to six post-surgical weeks, opening screw tops and especially adult-proof caps is excruciatingly painful. If unscrewing the cap on a bottle of detergent hurts, just imagine the effect of a corkscrew applied to a cheap bottle of wine!
3) We want some comfort food, and we don’t care how fat it makes us!!!!!!!!!
4) All those items in daily use — the dog dishes, the giant Costco bottle of Maker’s Mark, the French press coffeemaker — really, truly NEED to come down from the high shelves in the kitchen.
So it’s time for a raid on Amazon, there to buy a package of two female versions of the famed Wife-Beater: in woman language, “cotton tank tops.” These, we’re told by those in the know, will absorb any leakage (t0 be expected, argh urk) from the tubes installed in our chest to collect drainage from the not-so-gaping wounds to be inscribed thereupon.
From there to Knitted Knockers, which gives away freebie knitted prosthetics to the cancer-victimized…sorry, by golly, to “cancer survivors.” 🙄 This, even though we know our friend Windy City Gal is making a much nicer pair for us. We figure an extra pair, even though evidently inferior to Windy’s, will be handy to have around.
Then it’s over to PinkPockets, there to ask for a set of five self-stick “pockets” to attach to the inside of whatever piece of clothing you care to name, to hold the “grenades” (suction devices) for the drainage tubes we will be fitted for. Mastectomy Buddy has kindly provided a strap-on bulb-holding purse, which looks like it (also!) will be superior, since one of PinkPockets’ customers complained vociferously that the product’s double-sided tape didn’t work.. So the stick-on pockets, too, amount to a back-up.
Buddy’s daughter whipped up a pair of these, one for her mom and one for moi. They attach to you with an elastic waistband, and they hold four (count’em, FOUR) grenades. Is this handy and dandy or not?
The plan is to wear this out of the hospital — whenever it gets here, it goes straight into the Overnight Bag collection.
Thence, we’re off to Sprouts, via the Walgreen ‘s.
At Walgreen’s, I picked up a package of safety pins, said to be necessary to pin the grenades…uhm, the drain pump thingies…to a bra or your clothes. (Ha ha! I love it where this writer compares the thing to a church incense censer!!!)
Also picked up a cheap toothbrush — I use an electric toothbrush, once affordable but now pretty much out of the question, which I am not about to take to a hospital — plus some dental floss to pack in the overnight baggie. WonderDentist, thank you very much, hands out toothpaste samples every time his underlings clean your teeth, so I had a nice new little tube to add to the pile of loot.
Crossing two main drags on foot from the Sprouts to the Walgreen’s, I pass a big bearded bruiser of a guy all decked out in a black leather gladiator outfit, complete with a black leather miniskirt. He is unsmiling. Does he take himself seriously? Is he stoned? Is he the butt of some biker gang’s initiation ritual? Or is he just crazy as a loon? I do not know. I dodge inside the store and lose myself in the labyrinth of aisles, knowing there’s a way out through the pharmacy and that the pharmacists do not have the physical strength between the three of them to stop me from vaulting over the counter and blasting out the back door.
At Sprouts, what should I stumble across but a package of lovely chicken thighs and two packages of lovely lamb shanks? Both of these are the Stuff of Comfort Food.
The plan is to cook up an entire package of Costco pasta, toss it in a little olive oil, and freeze it in small packets. Then cook up all four lamb shanks with lots of onion, garlic, celery, and red wine. Freeze this into portion sizes, too. And last night I grilled the chicken pieces and dropped them in the freezer.
Contemplating the comfort-food qualities of these items, I recalled one of my favorite childhood dishes: my mother used to make this incredible garlic chicken under the broiler.
She would spike plenty of butter with garlic powder or (more likely) garlic salt. Then she’d baste the chicken pieces with that and run them under the oven broiler until done. (We lived in apartments, so there were no outdoor grills. Besides, no one ever heard of a propane grill in those days.)
Heh. My mother never used real garlic. Literally, I never saw a head of garlic until I reached graduate school and took up with friends who fell under the influence of Julia Child. She wouldn’t have known what to do with a clove of garlic. And come to think of it, I don’t know if my mother ever saw actual whole garlic.
Well, no bottles of powdered dehydrated garlic reside in my house these days. Only the real stuff will do.
It’s not the same.
I minced a couple cloves and melted them into some butter; basted the chicken thighs with it and let it sit for awhile. Added some adobo powder, figuring that would add the sort of je ne sais quoi flavor of artificial spice. Grilled, with frequent basting.
The result was very good, but not the same as my mother’s. Probably in reality better. But not the same.
Oh lordie! I overslept; it’s almost time for the cleaning lady to show up and the chill’s not off the house yet and I haven’t even started to fix dog-and-human-breakfast.
And so, away!
Gronk! I’m back! They ran electric current through the brain and the whole apparatus lurched to life!!!
