MAKING PROGRESS... of sorts (Part 172ff)

MAKING PROGRESS… of sorts (Part 172ff)

My next stop was to pick up the flowers and then on to the hospital. Visiting hours didn’t officially start until 7pm but there was no one at the desk when I walked into the lobby at around 6:60pm. Elle’s room was in the old part, the part that had originally been a house, and I took the stairs to the second floor. It was like all the nurses were on break because I saw no one. I walked in expecting to see the woman who’d been there when she finally got a bed only to find it made up and empty. Elle was asleep and the tray with her dinner was on the table between the beds and it looked like she hadn’t eaten much of it. Common sense told me that wasn’t good. Her main problem was anemia and since she’d been there she’d been on intravenous feeding. I was willing to wait for her to wake up but a nurse walked in and asked why I was there. Elle heard the voice and woke up while I was explaining. With her eyes open she looked a little better but still was far from looking like herself. She smiled when she saw the flowers. I didn’t know what to do with them so just stood there with them in my hand. She told me the D and C procedure had been performed in the morning and said it went well. When Elle declined to try and eat anything more the nurse took the tray away and left us alone. I asked if she’d talked with the kids and she said she hadn’t so I made the call. After Elle had talked with them she was like a different person. But, when I asked if she talked with the doctor that took some of the life out of her. She made a face and said the earliest she’d be released was Saturday… and that wasn’t what I’d wanted to hear.

It was obvious she wanted to talk about what the doctor had told her. I already knew that she felt it was probably a good thing as far as Elle’s health was concerned but I didn’t say anything. I sat on the edge of the bed and listened. It quickly became clear that the doctor had told Elle a lot more than she’d told me. After a few minutes she took one of my hands and asked me how I felt about losing the baby. I didn’t answer right away and she took that silence to mean I was upset. Then she told me the doctor had told her if the pregnancy had gone on it could’ve put her at risk and that it was best that it had happened when it did. I’ve already written that I, selfishly, was relieved. However, I wasn’t the one carrying the baby and it was her inner feeling that were the most important. I’m not an emotional person but her concern about my feelings really got to me.

I sat there on the bed holding both her hands as we worked our way through both our inner feelings and what was the most important for us going forward. We held hands until my leg went to sleep because of the angle I was sitting on the edge of the bed. When I stood up I had no feeling in my left leg. By then we’d agreed that having another child should not realistically be in our future. Elle admitted that she was really looking forward to teaching full time and had been disappointed when she realized she was pregnant but didn’t want to admit it. She had it in her mind that I’d been “cheated” when Kaye was born. We’d both hoped for a boy but I thought I’d made it clear that the only thing I wanted from that pregnancy was a healthy baby. It had become clear that she still had some latent feelings about not having a son.

The more we talked it became clear that she was getting really tired. When the nurse came in for her last round before going off duty she suggested that it was time for me to leave. I gave her a kiss along with the best hug I could with her lying there in bed. I reminded her that I wouldn’t be there until around 7pm and told her I loved her… and headed out the door. I hadn’t eaten anything since I’d left the house in the morning and I was starving. I also wanted to stop at the garage to check on the race car. I decided the quickest way to eat was to stop at Traveler’s Rest, the place where we got our pizzas. It was in the same town as the garage and only minutes away. I went in to get two slices to take out but as I did I saw Alan and Buster sitting at a table. I went over and asked what they were doing there. Buster broke out laughing but Alan smacked him in the arm. It was another case of how screwed up we, as a team, were.

They’d showed up to put the motor in the car hoping to be able to start it up. After getting the motor in the chassis they discovered they’d mis measured the where the motor mounts were to go so they had to cut them out, make new ones and weld them in place. While Dick and Cliffy were doing that Alan realized that they didn’t have exhaust headers for the big block Chevy engine. With all the list for all the parts for the motor headers were never added. So, Cliffy started making calls to some of the other teams to try and find one that had a spare set or weren’t planning on racing on Saturday night. Then, mentioning racing and Saturday night in the same breath brought me to tell them I wouldn’t be going. They knew about Elle and understood why I wouldn’t be going. But, I still didn’t know what they were doing for headers.

“Tuned” exhaust headers were just coming into vogue about then. I won’t go into the  engineering aspect of them but some of the teams that had gone the big block Chevy way when it first came out and upgraded their headers and had their original ones as spares. Cliffy had become good friends with a driver from the adjacent county who owned and ran a marina. He offered us a set of his old ones but we’d have to come and get them. Robob, the part-time crew member, lived closest to the marina and Cliffy had asked him to pick them up. That news made me somewhat happy because I really wanted to be there when they started the motor and now there was a chance. I sat and ate with them and while I did there were any number of people who were there asked when we were going racing again. That was encouraging especially since it had been almost a month since we’d last raced.

Friday was a repeat of Thursday as far as work was concerned with one exception… I was able to get something to eat at lunch. I brought Bret up to date on the race car and he said he would be going the next night. When I told him I wouldn’t be going and why I realized I hadn’t told any one at work about the miscarriage. It didn’t take long for the ‘word’ to get out and I had to go though all the “I’m so sorry’s” for the rest of the day. At the hospital I found Elle much improved and excited that she might be going home the next day. Even though it meant I’d miss the races I was still hoping to get to the garage for in time to watch and hear the motor when it was started.

To be continued…