Oxygen
When I arrived in hospital this morning David was hidden behind his oxygen mask. I saw his eyes and immediately knew that he was doing well. I said so. He mumbled something behind his mask about the doctor. I had to be patient for 20 minutes before he could talk to me.
“I have good news,” he said, after he finished his oxygen cure, and he told me that the doctor is optimistic about the first response to the medication. “And I might even get out of bed tomorrow to see how my lungs respond!” Nice to start the day in hospital with this news.
Touched
David is at his best in the morning.The first two hours together I spent reading out loud all the personal messages received by e-mail. I did it bit by bit. Sujatin had collected a lot of these emails from sangha members all around the world.
Dharmavidya - David - enjoyed it very much, to hear from so many people. He was touched by all the messages, but I noticed also that it did cost him energy.
Pooh
We had a relaxed and easy day. David is still weak, but has more energy than yesterday. He read out loud some poems without being as tired by doing so as yesterday. Yesterday we finished one of our favourite books 'The world of Christopher Robin' by A.A. Milne (writer of Whinny the Pooh) - wonderful poetry, lovely rhymes, cute little stories in a musical rhythm.
Bold and compassionate
This morning I brought some poetry books from David's library for him to read. A wild guess, I had not really a good idea what I had to take with me. David was very happy to see one of his mother's favourite poetry books: “Sixty Poems of Rudyard Kipling”, poetry of the late 19th century. He read me a couple of the poems and I was happy to see some of his characteristic passion showing.
Immediately while he is reading I have these images of this bold, sometimes rude, yet compassionate soldier who is writing poetry. A strange mixture of male roughness and loving observations of the reality around him.
Change and Chess
Later in the afternoon Annette came for a quick visit. She was happy, too, to see David improving. David gave us a good laugh , when he was told that people were praying for him all over the world, he said, “Well, in that case, if I don't recover and expire, I'll change my religion.”
Today I stretched my legs a bit by a short walk through the corridors of the hospital. I had seen a kind of library room and visited it. I was lucky to find a mini chess game. In the afternoon we played one game. Tomorrow, I will try to take revenge.
Bishop lost
David was then preparing the mini board for another game. We had a lot of laughter when he suddenly said out loud “Oh no, I lost the bishop!” one of the tiny pieces had rolled out of the board into the bed. A Buddhist priest searching for a bishop in a hospital bed is quite funny...
The day flew by and I am looking forward to tomorrow. I would like to see David out of his hospital bed.
Replies
Thank you Elja.
David, estamos contigo !!
Love
Edu
Dear Elja, I'm very happy David gets better......thanks a lot for sharing!
Good to hear that David is recovering. Hope we will hear his laugh soon ! Love from Wangmo & Cédric
continued warm thoughts and loving energies pouring toward David. Such a compassionate, intelligence, generous human being is very rare...much love from Charlene
If one can lose his bishop he really is doing better! I am very glad for all of you. What a shock it was! Congratulations David and Elja! Keep up and get well!!