To Be Like A Lotus

Our little pond in our tiny yard has been a source of calm in our lives. Each year we patiently wait for the leaves of our lotus to unfurl on to the surface. Later the flowers poke their buds up and spread their petals towards the sun. These same flowers retract under the water at night.

It is because of this rising from the mud that the lotus plant is associated with rebirth. From darkness, beauty. They teach us patience and show us we can rise above the miasma that sometimes finds us.

The past few months have seen us anywhere from the summit of mountains to the muddy muck of ponds. While our personal highs and lows have not been such a roller coaster recently, there have been moments where they felt that way.

Rich started his latest ketamine treatments in the middle May and went on into June. He had a small bout of pneumonia somewhere in the middle. Some antibiotics and six-day pack of medrol (steroids-lite), nebulizing over and over for months to come and we figure we’re good to go.

At the end of June, we reached a summit. Literally and figuratively. We set off for Maine by way of New Hampshire and Sturbridge Mass, singing in the car at the top of our lungs. Rich was at the wheel for the first time without another driver in the car to relieve him when he got tired. No more belt and suspenders… we were on our own.

Sturbridge has always been a place of peace for us. So many wonderful memories of family weekends… quiet winter mornings and hearty meals by the warmth of the fireside. Newborn animals in the spring, kiln fired pottery in the summer, the change of seasons and a chance to slow down. This was now just an overnight stop along the way as we traveled north, but, as always, it refreshed our spirits.

Rich’s feet were now renewed with ketamine and MMJ keeping the neuropathy at bay. The open road lay before us. The fog lifted from the White Mountains of New Hampshire as we drove, the peaks revealing themselves slowly through a haze. Adventure was in the air. Our plan for these next two days? Mountains… glorying in the mountains. We were not climbing and very few trails had our names on them.

As has been our need these last few years, we’ve made adjustments. On this day, we were traveling via train through the valley of the White Mountains and into the Notch. We would sit in a dome car, sheltered from the intermittent rain, and watch the waterfalls, gorges, woodlands and vistas through the windows of the vintage rail car. We would marvel as the walls of the notched stone closed in on either side before opening once more to the valley view below. We ate in the period dining car, reveling in the flavors and views.

The following day we found ourselves on the summit of the tallest mountain on the East Coast… Mt Washington. Here, the highest winds on the planet have been recorded. The old summit observatory and stage office displays a plaque on its exterior: 231 Miles Per Hour. We are awed to see this same building has thick chains that go up and over the roof in three places… secured into the granite to keep the roof, and the building, from flying away.

Despite our gear, we did not hike to this mountaintop. Rich’s feet and lungs, though so improved on his current regimen, are not up to the task. Instead we travel as others have for almost 150 years, we take the cog railway. Our fascination with trains has not prepared us for the wonder of this ride. It is not the view that captivates us. We can barely see through the clouds as we ascend; indeed, the fog itself rolls through the open windows of the car. It is the engineering that brings us such delight. What imagination!

With this help, we stand in the mist of the clouds at the top of our world. And we grin happily as if we had walked every step of the way. Success!

Our weekend continues and we’re ultimately back home, tired but content. We have not seen the stunning landscape that the telescopes promise at the top of Mount Washington as the clouds never rose enough and we could barely see three feet ahead. But the journey itself was the prize. This could never have happened within the three years since Rich’s diagnosis.

The wheezing, though, never quite went away from the pneumonia. We check in with our pulmo doctor who recommends, cautiously, prednisone. A small dose. Rich agrees… it is time to hit this with all we can and get it gone once and for all. And so once more our beneficial bane is back with all its accompanying side effects. The second day on this med and Rich has had enough. The doom and gloom of the adrenals is hitting and hitting hard.

The morning of the third day I leave what sounds like a rather hyperbolic message with the pulmo doctor. Quality of life is gone. We’re in the muck. She know us.  She know we don’t exaggerate. We’re to stop prednisone immediately and to continue with the regimen of nebulizing. No need to wean off as the dose was so small and for such a short period of time. We’re relieved. Ready for that lotus to push through and blossom once more.

That relief is short lived. The two days later Rich is on his way to pick me up at the train station and his eyes are full of tears. He admits, it’s been a rough day. When we get home, the truth of that statement shows how inadequate it is.

Prednisone has many side effects and we’ve dealt with most. For whatever reason, it now manifested itself as it had never done before. As he drove down the street, Rich felt an overwhelming urge to open his car door and jump out into traffic in front of a moving truck. Again, his strength leaves me in awe.

The psychosis that prednisone can inflict has hit hard. He fought back and won. The doctors are stunned to hear this latest development. And yet, they nod. It’s a known problem. We spend the weekend on tenterhooks to keep this demon away.

By Sunday, in all ways, we can breathe a sigh of relief. This has passed us by. And so, we spent a weekend a month later celebrating Rich’s third year post-transplant. The roller coaster continues, but we honor our journey to date and give thanks for the life we live.

One of our celebrations found us in an apartment in Brooklyn attending class. Before us were a selection of mostly primary colored acrylic paints, some brushes, and canvases with dried lotus leaves applied. We spent the day mixing colors, some ending up the same color as the mud from which these lotuses grow, and applying the paints to our textured canvases. What a reflective and yet spirited adventure this was! We hang our masterpieces in our home proudly.

A few weeks later, we spend some time once again the mountains, this time in the Catskills of New York. Our weekend is one of appreciation. Appreciation of the journey we’re on, the light and life we’ve been given and the beauty around us.

Some of that beauty in the amazing meals we enjoy by chefs who know what they are doing. Some in the architecture of mansion along the Hudson that we visit. Most of the beauty we celebrate is that of artisans, certainly more skilled than ourselves, who show their work at a juried festival we attend.

On our way back to Long Island, we stop at the botanical garden in the Bronx where we enjoy the artistry of Chihuly and of nature in bloom. There we find, within the garden’s, ponds displays of lotus, rising through the murky water, from their roots in the muck of mud, to reveal the light and color to which we humans can only aspire to replicate. From the depths comes beauty that raises us up to the light.

And for that reason we continually celebrate.

Rebirth.