Smack Out of the Blue.......

Today was the day for cataract surgery #1.....my left eye.

Dave and I were at the hospital early in the morning and after awhile he left to go find coffee while the nurses got me ready, the anesthesiologist stopped by and my eye doctor came in to answer any last minute questions.

And then, lying on the gurney, covered with those nice warm hospital blankets, IV installed in my hand, blood pressure cuff around my arm.....I waited. I closed my eyes and went to "my happy place"...at anchor on Connemara down in the Bahamas. I really wasn't nervous....but then again, I only have two eyeballs!

Suddenly I could hear another nurse talking on a phone in the hall - she was relaying patient information to someone. It concerned the patient next to me....also in for cataract surgery. Nothing terribly personal......but then the nurse said "her name is Claudia Clark" and I teared up.

My cousin......my dear cousin who died in September..... the friend, the pal, the artist that I still miss so very much.

Her cataracts were caused by chemotherapy. She described seeing colors so differently after her surgeries. How bright they were.....how many shades of green and brown and blue and red and yellow were suddenly clear to her again. How beautiful this world around us.

One Claudia Clark was my cousin.....and the other was a woman I'd never met in the room next to mine.

I took it for what it was....a nudge, a touch, a whisper of "it's going to be fine...wait until you see the colors!"

When I was discharged a few hours later Dave and I walked down the hallway. I realized that the woman's daughter was sitting in the room waiting for her to come back. I stopped and smiled at her and said "Piece of cake.....it wasn't hard at all and your mom will be just fine."  Her response was "Wow....thank you so much for that."

Least I could do.....pass on a Claudia message to another Claudia.