Sunday night brought the paramedics into the bay opposite with an obviously distressed patient. You can't not look and you certainly can't not hear, even with an iPod plugged in. He looked awful and a deeply lemon colour. The young doctor arranged emergency treatment for the patient with liver failure.
He was swiftly tended, prepared and moved on. To where? I didn't ask but later I did comment on his colour to the nurse taking my blood pressure, temperature and pulse. Have you seen yourself lately, he asked? If he was fresh lemon you are a lemon beginning to dry out. Pretty yellow, then.
Monday arrived and so did a young doctor, another familiar face, to tell me that I was likely to be discharged that very day. Surprisingly I think I was not feeling well enough to experience excitement but the prospect of a good night's sleep did appeal.
This young man visited frequently, explaining that I would need no medication and if this then do that, which I can't remember which is why I needed my wife to be there. As she was to meet the main man. I do remember signing some papers and I remember the ward sister squeezing a number of syringes of clear liquids in the cannula just prior to its removal.
Sat on the end of my bed I saw the main man enter the ward whereupon he began wandering about, looking in offices before finally talking with the ward sister, entering a side room with her whereupon the occupant of said room was evicted and extra seats taken in.
This, too, had a degree of familiarity. The last time I witnessed such behaviour was as the doctor tried in vain to find a space to tell us the worst about my mum's cancer. At that time we met in a room from which the occupants did not leave but stayed at their desks carrying on as the doctor told us there was no more they could do. We kept quiet as my sister had arranged transfer to a hospice. St.Julia's Hospice were as excellent as RCH Treliske was shameful.
This meeting was in a quiet, calm, comfortable room with a delightful ward sister, an utterly confidence inducing doctor, a gentle supremely professional cancer nurse, my wife and I.
Eventually the word "cancer" was delicately dropped into the conversation but amid all the positives it was hardly a surprise when it came. The next phase would take place at a much bigger hospital 50 miles down the road.
Before that, however, they would restore my colour to something approaching normality. They would also do a biopsy of the unwelcome lump. This would require a procedure down the throat, through the stomach around the bend and down a bit from which a biopsy would be taken and a stent put in. This would make the juices flow and thus the derangement of the blood would become significantly reduced. It could not be done at the moment, though, so I could go home.
The ward sister had departed earlier now came back to tell us that blood tests would be taken daily at our surgery. Sorted. The cancer nurse explained a number of options but to be honest my wife's note taking is all I can really remember. I do remember her emphasising the fact that the blockage my not necessarily be malignant as she then told us of the down the gullet process that would take place and how we could not be fitted in for either Wednesday or Friday this week so expect early next week.
I also remember the pamphlets and booklets being offered, accepted and put in the handbag. I see them frequently being read although I have to confess to not having read them myself, yet.
The meeting over and no medication to collect we were free to go. Amid heartfelt thanks and words that could never do justice to what was deserved we went.
Home was quiet, calm and so, so lovely.
The phone began ringing and the management adopted her secretarial role.
Visitors visited next day.
I had a coffee.
A proper full on Gaggia espresso coffee.
It nearly did for me and for the first time in my life I added water to an espresso.
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