Shane's Eye - Update

September 24, 2013

Shane needs her lens replaced and her cornea sutured, in her right eye, ASAP. The doctor said time is of essence because the cornea has a tear and the contents of her eyeball could burst through the tear, and she would lose her eye.

I’m going to get up early tomorrow morning and start my search for a sack of money along the roadside. And after I find it, I’m going to call up that doctor and say “Schedule the surgery doc! We found a sack of money by the road and we’re ready!”

I've always been a fan of good fortune. Clean living, pure thoughts and prayer never did me much good. And my hard-work ethic has always been profitable for the company that employed me. But when Lady Luck smiles my way, I recognize it for what it is, and an inner smile of gratitude pervades the very soul of me and gives me comfort.

When trouble comes, I know that good luck is just around the corner. Religion works pretty much the same way. It soothes and comforts, but for the price of selling your soul to the devil in the white collar, who has a plan all laid out for your life which includes a profit for his company, the church. Someone once said that a sucker is born every minute, but the religions of the world know for a fact that the frequency is much higher.

Shane can’t see anything with her right eye. When the left one is covered, the right just rolls around looking for something that she knows is there but won’t come into view. My little girl is in a stew of trouble but she doesn’t even know it. Or else she just has some instinctive wisdom that keeps her happiness afloat. With a regular habit of giggling with delight, she knows that life is both fun and funny. I keep trying to figure out what natural phenomenon that is, and why I’ve allowed it to be taken away and replaced with a fear for living without a god, the bible and the chosen messenger who can show me the way to happiness while I tread through a world of sin and the certain destruction of my soul if I don’t believe. Our Father, indeed!

Shane will be fine. Emelie and I will make sure she is.

It’s 4 AM. She just got up to pee and see what Hon Hon is doing. She’s sitting right beside me at the kitchen table, drawing monsters on paper while I type. Heads are circles, half circles, triangles and squares (she likes sponge bob). It’s a joint project. I’m assigned the task of putting on the hands and arms. She does the body, legs and feet. I don’t have to do a perfect job. She’s no critic.

It’s hard to keep her voice at a whisper while everyone else sleeps. Just that excitement in her that is so familiar to all of us. It can’t be contained or quieted. When I go back to sleep in a little while, she will do her best to keep me awake until I ask her to leave me alone, for the umpteenth time. And then she’ll nod off until dawn. When she wakes up, I need to be fresh and ready for a full day of questions, suggestions and an invitation to join in whatever activity she has in mind.

Didn't know I could do this childhood thing again, but the second time is all the fun without the scraped knees, disappointments and bewilderments of being a 4 year-old in a world of insane adults who can’t seem to remember what it’s like to make enjoyment a priority.

I’m learning.

The Consequences of Poking Around

August, 2013

Five weeks ago, Shane stuck a sharp object in her eye. The end of the bottle opener was more like a weapon of child destruction than a tool of peaceful living. She was pretending to open coke bottles when the accident occurred. Emelie and I didn't see it happen. We heard crying and saw her with her face in her hands.

Like all concerned parents, we imagined the worst and hoped for the best. It seems the former is more likely to be the result. I tested her sight yesterday by covering one eye and and asking her to identify simple objects which I held in my hand. The first clue to her lack of vision was her eye's inability to settle down and focus on the object just a few inches in front of her. Her eye roamed around this way and that as if searching for something to see. My heart dropped into a funk of sorrow at the sight of this. And then when I asked her to identify one object at a time, she only guessed and was wrong each time.

I am trying not to act too concerned around her. Her own attitude hasn't changed one iota. She is still the cheerful and happy little girl she's grown into since first coming to us. I want to cry. Is now an okay time?

The eye doctor says he sees signs of a cataract forming. He says she scratched her cornea and hit the lens but he doesn't know how much damage there is, and if it can be repaired, until the eye is healed. We've been taking her to him every Saturday to check the progress of healing.

On a positive note, there has been no infection and she won't lose the eye as long as we keep infection away with the antibiotic cream we apply every three hours.

I don't know what else to tell you. The rest of what could be said is in the realm of feelings and not facts. If you've had children, then you probably already know our sadness and angst.

However, there is one  thing I need to say. What keeps my boat afloat is the fact that Shane has remained on an even keel. If she was an adult, I would suspect that her apparent sense of well-being might be a decided cover for the sake of protecting herself, and us, from true feelings of sadness. But she has yet to learn of such deception and shows her feelings in the moment they occur.

In addition, self-pity is not a part of Shane's program. I suspect she learned to avoid this pitfall from observing my wife. A great role model in not feeling sorry for oneself, she takes life as it comes and plays an active role in her own destiny, without dwelling on the hand she is dealt.

The two of them are a marvel to me.