Right back where I started

I went around the world by plane, boat, horse cart, canoe, bike, foot, bus, train, carriage, and probably some other means of transportation I've overlooked.  Now I'm back home, in my own little house, at my same job, in my treasured circle of family and friends.  I traveled over 20,000 nautical miles and 6000 air miles to make the trip, losing a whole day and picking it back up through more than a dozen time changes as I traveled westward around the globe.  I crossed the equator twice and the prime meridian at least five times.  At one point, I crossed them together.

This week marks another way I am back where I started.  As I unpacked for the first time on board, I lost the sight in my left eye and was sidelined temporarily by what looked like a vitreous detachment.  After consultation with the ship's doctor and an ophthalmologist in San Diego, I was allowed back on the ship, cautioned to watch for further symptoms and see a doctor when I got back home.

So Wednesday, I went for a routine follow up visit to a new ophthalmologist.  I thought I would run down from the office, get checked out, and be back for an afternoon meeting.  (My office is up two flights of stairs and down one corridor from the eye clinic, a benefit of working in the hospital.)  Instead, I wound up having some kind of procedure that evidently has no name other than "sort of a spot welding, but with lasers."  I have asked several times, but this is all I get.  It felt more like jack hammers, but with lasers.  Or staple gun, but with lasers, since the idea is to tack down the retina, not break it up.

Turns out I had three tears in the retina, of uncertain age.  I wasn't having any symptoms, so it's likely that they occurred at the time of the original incident back in January.  Fixing them required 1500 of something, presumably beams of intense light aimed at my eyeball over the course of two hours.  Not pleasant.

Recovery was also not pleasant.  I wound up calling my (amazing) boss, who administers the ophtho department as well as my own, which set into motion a whirlwind of concern.  (The retinal fellow made a few rookie mistakes, like not giving me any aftercare instructions, or his name.  He also did not get a consent for the procedure, which set into motion a whole different whirlwind and resulted in my treatment being taken over by the attending.)

My (third) new eye doctor says don't lift anything over five pounds and don't do anything more strenuous than walk around the block, which is my kind of medical advice.  He also says watch TV instead of reading, knowing it's unrealistic to expect no reading or computer work for the next three months.  I am practicing my touch typing skills, and I am being conservative about my screen time, but there's no realistic way to move through my life without computer screens for the next month.

As is so often the case, this medical intervention gives me much to think about in terms of how medical care is delivered and how dependent consumers are on providers whose qualifications we have no way of judging.

I work in a teaching hospital, and I am fully prepared to have care provided by a team that includes medical students, residents, fellows, and often puts attending physicians into a background role.  It can be an uneasy balance.  As a person with only one body, a relatively healthy one, I don't have a lot of points of intersection with the system.  I have no way of differentiating between routine, emergent, acute.  I've been here long enough that I know health care decisions can also be an uneasy balance.  I, too, have to find the balance between criticizing the system and benefitting from the favors I can call in.

All of this balancing has left me a little unbalanced.  I walked in expecting a routine visit and had instead a very thorough examination (which is, I suppose, the routine) that uncovered a condition that was treated immediately.  Was it emergent (in need of immediate treatment)?  The San Diego doctor said that if he had uncovered/suspected a retinal tear, he would have sent me to a specialist and it would have been 10 days to 2 weeks before I was treated, so he had no issues with my taking off on a journey to a host of third world countries.  My Charlottesville doctors said let's see if the laser suite is available yay it is and have a seat.  Whoosh!

Same eye, totally different treatment approaches.  Not sure the new docs would have been so sanguine about sending me off for four months.  Does "don't pick up more than 5 pounds" also mean, "there's no way in hell you should get on a plane"?  Lucky for me, I don't need to find out.  If there was a bullet there, I dodged it and had a fabulous trip around the world.

Two weeks out, I am in the eye clinic for a third follow-up visit.  My eye has been dilated so often the pupil is (semi? no one knows) permanently larger.  I am once again hypervigilant about every floater. Mostly, today, I am wondering why people come on time for a doctor who is two hours behind schedule.  I should have brought lunch.  Also, a power supply for the computer.

The waiting room here is crowded, with many people here accompanied by someone younger, or at least someone who can drive them home.  There are two nice ladies in orange outfits, which may be coincidence or may be ashram-dyed-to-match.  The man sitting nearby just showed me a closeup picture of his truck tire, featuring two pieces of grass which look EXACTLY like a cross.  (Clearly, he is the designated driver.  None of the actual patients could see well enough to have discerned this apparent miracle.)

The strawberries I put in my smoothie this morning looked EXACTLY like hearts.  Until I mercilessly crushed them.  Life is full of unrecognized miracles, cynics, and folks searching for something to kill a few hours.

Algú m'estima

I've been away from the trip and from the blog for over a month now.  My loyal Russian friends, whoever they are, are still checking in from time to time.  In any month's time, there are 16 hits from Russia, which leads me to believe it's an automated blog visit, only showing up because my real-person audience is overwhelmingly from the USA.  (German fans, the Russians are giving you a run for pride of second.)

I was pretty disciplined about writing on the ship (although I never quite caught up after leaving Japan).  But at home, there are many more distractors.  Try putting your work, family, social lives on hold for four months, and then add deferring all health and home maintenance issues.  Why, there's hardly enough time to catch up on bad American teevee!  And there are still billions of Sudoku puzzles I have not completed.

Which is to say that I totally mistook "limited internet" for discipline.  All those good habits I had on the ship have disappeared.  With the force of a slingshot pulled waaaay back.  I only gained a couple of pounds on the ship, but access to American restaurant portions, snack foods, and choice in general have undone all those flights of stairs climbed.  (Except for trips carrying my luggage to be weighed, I never used the elevators on the ship.)

I have also replaced blog writing with actual conversation.

Ohmigod, you're back!  When did you get back?
What was your favorite port?
Was it worth it?

But it's always been my intention to tell the rest of the story, post some more pictures, and maybe even transition the blog into the third half on land.  While lots of you have told me you couldn't keep up with the blog, some folks have flattered me with assurances they read every post.

So stay tuned.

The heart pillow/quilt I schlepped around the world meets my Barcelona bedding.