My Lucky Day (a Friday the 13th ponderance)

What is luck?  I guess it's all a matter of perspective...

The other day, I took Alex out to Valley of Fire State Park.  It was a lovely day, blue sky, temps in the 50's.  I took the scenic route, which goes through Lake Mead National Park.  Gorgeous desert landscapes, layers of mountains in every direction, and once in awhile, a bend in the road reveals the clear blue waters of the lake in the distance.  Alex has been a part-time resident of Las Vegas for 4 years, but until recently, he never saw anything beyond the casinos.  I've been telling him about how incredibly friendly the people of Las Vegas are, but he's only seen the people who work and hang out at the casinos (not generally the friendly sort; more the desperate and embattled sort).  I've been telling him about the beautiful homes and neighborhoods away from The Strip, but he's only left The Strip to drive out to border-town casinos.  I've been telling him about the beauty of the desert, but he's only been aware of the desert by the heat and arid conditions outside of the climate-controlled casinos.  Alex has really never experienced Las Vegas, beyond what the average weekend warrior has experienced, anyway.  But this past month, I've made it my mission to expose him to some of the beauty of Las Vegas.  It's been necessary, as this town has been kicking him in the teeth for months now.  It's been kicking both of us in the teeth, really, but my teeth-kicking has been more by default.  It's what a partnership is about, I suppose:  When he feels pain, I feel pain.  When he gets knocked down, I do my best to lift us both up.  And the truth is, he's been knocked down so many times in the last number of months that it's been hard to know which way is up.  My entire concept of justice has been blended into fiction, and the idea of stability seems like a very foreign concept.  2008 was an incredibly challenging year, and thus far, 2009 makes '08 seem like a bit of a cake-walk.  It's been hard to believe, at times, that life can be beautiful, that hard work pays off, that we are protected by the law rather than it's innocent targets.  But I have refused to give up, and at times, when Alex has been able to see nothing but ugliness, I have made it my mission to show him all that we have that is worth fighting for.  Because, as much as life has really kind of SUCKED in a lot of ways, we are so very lucky.  We have so many good people in our lives.  Here in Vegas, Alex has a whole bunch of guys who, on that October night he spent in jail, were calling to ask how they could help, ready to come to the courthouse with bail money in hand.  I've got a voice teacher who has refused to accept money from me, even though she needs new brakes and a root canal that she can't afford.  Across the country, we've got friends who have asked if we'd like them to fly out here, just to offer support.  My girl Liz spent a week out here with her shoulder entirely covered in snot, as I couldn't remove my sobbing self from her arms, and she made it clear that she'd hold me up as long as I needed.  Our families are wonderful, letting us know that whatever happens, they are here for us.  And perfect strangers are praying for us.  Seriously.  There's an entire convent in New Jersey praying round-the-clock novenas for Alex.  They don't know him, nor do they know why he needs help; all they know is that a friend of a friend is in need of support, and so he is in their prayers, 24 hours a day.  (I actually worried for awhile that these prayers might be doing him some harm.  I mean, he's an atheist, so perhaps a convent of nuns praying for an atheist might have a reverse effect?  But he is so very honored by the selflessness of these women, he is so very grateful for their support and generosity, so it can't be a bad thing.  Can it?)  When I think about it, we have SO MUCH to be grateful for, even as we are living through what is by far the most trying time in our 13 years together.  And that's saying a lot, considering the lives we've lived.  But there's no question, in our shared existence of ups and downs, we've reached a new depth in the downside.  And we've learned things about each other, and perhaps the most important thing we've learned is that we can get through anything, as long as we're doing it together.  

Anyway.  Back to Valley of Fire.  I've been wanting to show Alex some of what is beautiful about this place we are currently forced to reside in (we would have left weeks ago, if it were not for legal matters which are keeping us here).  I've taken him away from The Strip, where he's had a chance to meet these friendly people I've been telling him about.  I've driven him to new neighborhoods, with actual sidewalks and houses and no sounds of slot machines (which, strangely, Liz found to be very soothing while she was here).  And on Wednesday, I drove him out to see the beauty of the desert.  We drove for two hours, and around every bend in the road, there was something to be amazed by.  The colors of the desert, the blacks and golds and purples, and especially the reds.  Rich red rock bursting out of the sage-covered earth.  Stunning.  The Valley of Fire takes it's name from this rock.  It's a color that seems so foreign, as if we'd found ourselves suddenly roaming through the empty wilderness of Mars.  I was here for the first time two weeks ago, when Liz was visiting.  She and I could hardly walk 5 feet without stopping and shouting out, "Where are we??"  It was entirely un-Earthly.  We climbed the rocks, with their little nooks and crannies perfectly sized for our toes and fingers, we dug our feet into the red powdery sand, we sighed aloud and shouted out HEEEEEYYYYYYYYYYYY, then listened to the silence that followed, a silence so deep that it sounded almost like static, a silence so full that it felt almost deafening.  I wanted to take Alex here, to help him forget, for even a few moments, the hellish reality we've been struggling through for these many months.  I wanted him to see how beautiful life can be, if you just open your eyes to it.  The night before, I had seen the most amazing moon I'd ever experienced in my many years of moon-worship:  It was pumpkin orange, sitting low on the horizon, just above the brass of the Wynn, and it was bigger than the Wynn itself.  AMAZING.  I called Alex, who had been driving back from California, through 200 miles of nothing but desert, and he hadn't even noticed it.  So lost in his thoughts, he hadn't seen the huge ball of fire in the otherwise empty sky.  Sigh.  But with me by his side, oohing and aahing every shift in the ever-shifting landscape, the Valley of Fire was making a big impression on him.  He was already planning our next visit before we ever stepped out of the car.  And when we did step out of the car, he raced to the rocks and began to climb.  He climbed with the joy and fearlessness of a child, while I stood on the ground like a worried  but joyful mother.  Here he was, the man that I love, the man who sees opportunity everywhere and fears next-to-nothing.  I grabbed my camera to capture the moment, a moment when I am certain his thoughts went no further than the present place and time, a moment of relative peace during these months of stormy uncertainty.  A car pulled up and asked him if they could take his picture.  Picture taken, the car drove off and Alex began to make his way down so we could do some exploring.  He slid along the smooth red stone, which covered his black clothes in a fine burnt powder, then he jumped the last few feet to the ground, at which point he landed on something that pitched him forward with vicious velocity onto his knees and hands.  He went down hard and was clearly in pain, so I helped him over to a rock where he could sit and we could roll up his pant leg to see how badly he'd scraped himself.  I figured it couldn't be that bad, as he could put some weight on his leg and he didn't tear his jeans at all.  But what bad luck, as soon as we arrived, for him to fall down.  Obviously, he wasn't going to be up for much hiking, which was highly disappointing.  While he was cursing himself for taking a fall, I slowly lifted the bottom of his left pant leg.  There was no blood dripping down, so it couldn't be that bad.  But then, well...

If you're squeamish, skip ahead to the next paragraph.

But then, I felt something squishy, somewhere below his kneecap.  And when I looked, I discovered that the squishy thing was the flesh that was supposed to be covering his kneecap.  HOLY CRAP!!  I told him to stay still, I'd go get the car, and I ran, my heart in my throat, thinking, "We're in the middle of the f*&%ing desert!!!  There's no hospital within 50 miles!!!"  I pulled the car around, sat him in the backseat, and slowly removed his pants, asking him PLEASE, DON'T LOOK!  I was terrified that he'd see his injury and pass out.  But of course, as the pants came off, he looked.  And the reality hit us.  

I got him into the backseat and drove to the Visitor's Center, where I was told that Vegas was our best chance for medical care.  Vegas would be an hour's drive minimum, and having spent some time in Vegas Emergency Rooms, we knew that we could then be waiting for many hours more before being seen by anyone.  Alex called a friend to ask which hospital he goes to in town.  (He actually called and said, "Hey, is your hospital public or private?" as we don't have any insurance.  His friend thought he was having a political debate or something and later told Alex, "Next time you need a hospital, don't ask if it's public or private, say I'M BLEEDING AND NEED A HOSPITAL!"  But even as he was in searing pain and putting pressure on his lacerated knee to keep it from bleeding, Alex was in control enough to consider the financial ramifications of his fall.  That's my guy!)  He was then advised to skip Vegas and drive 60 miles in the opposite direction to Mesquite, an Arizona/Utah border town, as he would probably be seen much sooner.  So, there I was, doing 85MPH on I-15 North, with Alex bleeding in the backseat from the goriest wound I'd ever seen in my life.  The whole time, he kept saying, "I'm fine, baby, just do the speed limit, don't worry about me, I'm fine."  But I couldn't help but worry.  I mean, (gory sentence coming up) I just looked at his kneecap without any skin on it!  And after all the hell of the previous months, I didn't know if this might send him over the edge.  But amazingly, he was calm as could be.  He handled this incredibly trying situation with grace and poise, just like I've known him to do many times before.  

Finally, we arrived at Mesa View Regional Hospital and pulled up to the emergency entrance.  There was a nurse there who asked if we needed a wheelchair, and she quickly returned to help us.  It wasn't until he was getting out of the car that the real bleeding began.  And man, did he bleed!  The nurse was highly impressed with the severity of his injury, and she wheeled him inside and immediately took him to a trauma room.  NO WAIT!!  There was not a single person in the waiting room, a sight I have never seen in an ER.  I had to fill out paperwork, and I could hardly hold the pen, I was shaking so much.  It wasn't until I sat down that I realized how upset I was, and I forced myself not to cry.  I just wanted to be with him!  The receptionist was wonderfully kind and told me someone would be out to update me soon.  I paced around for no more than 5 minutes before a nurse came to speak with me.  She told me that they were going to do some x-rays, and that I was welcome to come back, but it would be pretty gory and maybe I'd rather... "I just want to be with him," I told her.  I could handle gore, but I couldn't handle being away from him.  So she took me to his room, and there he was, propped up in a bed, with an antibiotic IV in his arm, surrounded by nurses and interns, all of whom seemed wowwed by how well he was handling things.  "If I saw a gash like that on my leg," said one nurse, "I would pass out!"  But Alex was cracking jokes, making everyone laugh, asking them if they could give him a copy of the pictures they were taking so he could show people.  (The printer they used was running low on toner, but they gave us a copy of their pic, which shows Alex's green leg oozing yellow blood.  A nurse and I made up a story about how he landed on an alien rock with seeped some Martian lifeform into him.  As I had my own camera, I took a few pics myself.  Pretty gory stuff)  Here was the guy that I met 15+ years earlier, the guy that could handle anything Life threw at him with a sense of humor and a rosy outlook.  I hadn't seen much of that guy during this season of our discontent, and I couldn't help but somehow feel a bit happy, as I watched the doctor injecting him with Lydocaine, as I watched him clean out the wound, as I watched the stitching and the pulling and the putting-back-together of my lover's leg.  How could I feel happy in a trauma room?  

And here's where I question, What is luck?  Alex is a gambler, so clearly, I've thought a lot about luck over the years.  But Alex doesn't gamble based on luck; he gambles based on ratios and probabilities and numbers.  Luck comes into play, certainly, but he doesn't rely on it.  So, what is luck?   When Alex saw how badly he was injured, we thought it was bad luck.  But in the trauma room, when the X-rays revealed no broken bones, and when (amazingly) they showed that Alex was barely a hair's width from tearing the tendon, an injury which would have required surgery and hospital stays and traction and months of care, it felt like good luck.  When we were in the middle of the desert wondering whether to drive an hour+ to the ER in Vegas or the ER in Mesquite, it felt like bad luck.  But when we were at the hospital, receiving the best care anyone could ever hope for, it felt like good luck.  When I turned off Alex's phone so that the ringing wouldn't disturb the doctor examining his injury, it felt like bad luck.  But when he later turned on his phone and had a series of returned calls from people he'd been trying to speak to for weeks, it felt like good luck. When Alex fell off that rock, it felt like bad luck.  But as we were driving the 80+ miles back to Vegas that evening, all we could talk about was how very lucky we were.  Honestly, it felt like he took that fall, and our luck changed.  For the better.  Finally.

24 stitches later, Alex is on crutches and in a knee brace.  He's in pain, and I am playing nursemaid.  But somehow, it's all okay.  It helps put things into perspective.  As bad as things are, they could be SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much worse.  We are so very fortunate, with our friends and our family, and especially, with each other.  We love each other, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, till death do us part.  And not a lot of people get that.  Yeah, I'm ready to have a little bit of easy in my life, I'm desperate to feel a sense of peace and productivity.  But I have no doubt that it's out there, and I have no doubt that I can handle whatever challenges Life throws my way.  (Though, for real, I think I've been challenged enough for one decade, at least.)  Whether it's Luck, or Fate, or the Power of Prayer (seriously, we've had so many people praying for us, it HAS to be doing some good), we've made it this far.  And I'm pretty sure that the really good stuff is just around the corner.

And, this water-baby is ready to leave the desert.  There's a rainforest up north that I want to check out for awhile...