Just A Couple of Crazy Daisies

If I were a paper doll, I’d be terrified of fire.  And water.  I’d be okay with fingers bending my elbows and knees, but I wouldn’t like being crumpled up in someone’s fist.  I’d want to be kept safe from chewing dogs, but a child’s smile would delight me.  I would be ridiculously slender.  In the winter, I’d want to be dressed in coats and hats and have little fur-topped snowboots tabbed around my feet.  In the summer, I’d like a nice sundress and sunhat and I could be barefoot if it’s too hard to cut out the little paper sandals.  That would be okay.

Oh, and I’d like a Dan paper doll to kiss and hug until sparks flew from our hearts.  He could wear a golf outfit and hold a nice paper putter and we’d pretend he just drained a 20-footer to win the U.S. Paper Open and I would rush out on the eighteenth green with a smile and a bouquet of rainbow-colored flowers tabbed onto my arms.

And there would be no fire or water or teeth or crumpling.

Yeah, I’d like that — I’d like that much better than these past few crazy daisy days where we’ve done nothing but run like mad with no time for writing or resting … or sparking.  First, there was that little thing about Dan’s sleep apnea. A few posts ago, I might have mentioned that he spent the night at a sleep study clinic where he was found to have about 35 episodes an hour where he doesn’t breathe.  So, being the mathematical genius I am, I figured out that 35 times an hour times, oh say, 8 hours a night = 280 times a night when my dearheart isn’t BREATHING. That’s 280 times a night when his brain startles him awake (and me, by extension, I might add), screaming at him, HEY, I NEED A LITTLE AIR UP HERE.  There’s not been much sleep in the old Bloggybirdery with all that startling and screaming going on.

Several days ago, a kind Respiratory Therapist fitted Dan with a CPAP mask thingy that straps around his head and blows a constant stream of air into his face all night.  How’s that for a sweet fix?  Picture having a hard plastic mask around your mouth and nose, held in place with straps around your head like that alien face hugger thing in the one movie I still refuse to watch again because it scared the daylights out of me.  Dan says the blowing air makes it easy as pie to breathe in, but, he adds, expiration against the wind in his face feels like trying to spit in a tornado — it just spins around and ends up back in his face.  The breathing in part is good, but there’s not much sleep that occurs if every breath out is a battle.

Now, with poor Dan fighting all night with a hissing foreign object strapped to his head, I’m suddenly having dreams of Sigourney Weaver and wondering if I should get a cat and change my name to Ripley.  His Respiratory Therapist insists he’ll get used to the mask very soon.  “You’ll get the best sleep you’ve ever had,” she said.  Riiiight.  Since the Day of the New Machine, we’ve both been like dishrags draped across the couch all day.  We don’t even bother to change channels on the TV because pressing a remote seems too much effort.  If we don’t like the program, it’s a great reason to take another nap before dark brings another night’s battle with that Alien Face Hugger.  I’ve decided to call it June because I had an Aunt June who stayed with us when I was a high schooler and she was all mean and slobbery like that terrifying alien thing from that movie I’ll never watch again and now I have to go to bed every night singing, “You are my lucky star.”

Yesterday, I bought Dan flowers to cheer him up — daisies dyed in rainbow colors of orange and purple and blue and green.  Crazy Daisies, they’re called.  I love them and they did well to brighten our spirits.  My only hope is that once Dan gets used to his CPAP machine and we’re sleeping again through the night … we don’t have some wacky sequel to this particular movie because as I recall, Ripley is totally bald in Alien II … and we all know how I feel about my recent hair saga.  But then again, if I were a paper doll, I could just have paper hair in all lengths and colors to tab onto my little bald paper head.

Tomorrow, if all goes well and I have the energy, I’ll write about the fine art of turning wood on a lathe, the Chinese herbalist who isn’t Chinese and Wilson’s first day as a Therapy Dog.