(62) Hospitals.

As a child I used to suffer from l. h. inner ear infections. I remember crying from pain a lot, day and night. My mother used to take me to an ear specialist Dr. Silberstein, who used to perform all sorts of painful tricks with long needles inside my ear. On the way to his surgery, I used to cry from the moment I sensed the direction. Eventually, at Christmas, 1941, at the age of 5 I was taken to a hospital where a Dr. Kretschmer performed an operation which eventually led to my complete recovery.

Of the time in hospital, I remember little: being in the same ward with several grown-up patients; my father following me to the operating room; smell of cotton wool soaked in ether (?) in my face; waking up with bandages around my head...

When I was about 13 (1949) an oozing ulcer developed in my r. h. forearm, just above the wrist. After several trips to the local doctor, I ended up in hospital, where I remained for about 2 weeks. The ulcer was cleaned every day, cauterised, on one occasion I even saw maggots cheerfully emerging from the puss before diving ticklishly back in, all to no avail. One day, in the presence of my mother, I was given an injection of penicillin, something that was a novelty at the time - and the next day I was with my mother sitting in a tram on the way home.

That was the end of my hospitals until almost 70 years later.

    This time (January 2017) it was with angina pectoris, and during the operation I received a five-way by-pass of blocked coronary arteries at Austin Hospital in Melbourne. The operation was performed by Dr. Patrick Pritzwald-Stegman. During the 22- hour long operation veins were removed from my left forearm, also from my right leg from mid-thigh down to the ankle. As well, a minor non-cancerous growth was removed from my left lung.

After the operation I spent 12 days in the hospital, of which the first three or four days I remember just the half-conscious haze through which I was viewing the surrounding, nurses, doctors and family visitors. The last few days did not last long enough for I enjoyed talking to several very interesting fellow-patients and nurses. With Patrick, the surgeon, I had but one long talk towards the end of my stay, then some 2-3 months later I spoke briefly with him during my last trip to the Hospital for the final check after which, a few weeks later, he died from the injuries he received during a footpath skirmish in front of the main entrance to his hospital. An excellent man!

    At home I felt rather weak and tired for a while, probably due to the number of pills I had to swallow every few hours for some 2-3 months. After that I began to feel normal and memory of the entire affair is slowly fading, now more than 4 years behind me.

A bit of (related?) history.

When I was 18, I was drafted into the Czechoslovak Air Force. Just prior to it I became friendly with a 15-years old girl who lived nearby; nothing serious, mind! While in the AF I was not allowed to come home often, so we kept in touch through fortnightly letters. Again, nothing serious, just exchange of information on everyday events. Eventually, after reading some books, I became enamoured with an idea of one man-one woman for life. Towards the end of my 2.5 years long service I decided to ask Marianna for hand as soon as I get out of the Air Force. I never mentioned the idea in my letters, though. As soon as I arrived home I decided to go and see her. As I was about to leave a childhood friend arrived to welcome me home. After a while I mentioned that I was going to see Marianna. “Marianna?”, exclaimed he, “she’s just getting married, she probably IS married already”…

With my emotions in turmoil, I decided not to see the girl, or her husband, whomever it may be, ever again!!! I was lucky that a few weeks later I met a girl with whom I was dabbling in athletics many years ago, we became lovers almost immediately, Marianna was forgotten, and I have never seen her again.

Some 45 years later I met a friend from long ago and I asked him whether he knows anything about Marianna: “Oh, she died long time ago”, was his casual answer.

That same friend has died himself a few years later and from his sister I learned that one of the mourners at his funeral was – Marianna!

Not knowing her married surname it took me a while to find her through a string of mutual friends and I rang her on the ‘phone. She was recently widowed, living in a flat, on the ‘phone sounding exactly as she sounded more than half a century ago. I asked her why did she marry in 1957 (when I was at the end of my Air Force service). “Married, in 1957?”, she laughingly exclaimed. It transpired that she married some 3 years later! I asked her who was the lucky man. She told me his name, who was (then) a boy I knew only from a distance. So, for 3 years she was single, living and moving about in the same area where we both lived, and we had never met each other! And why did you marry Him, I asked? “Charlie, you know, I really don’t know why…”, was her casual answer.

We ended the ‘phone chat and I stepped from the house into the garden. Deep in thoughts and emotions I started cutting grass as I was planning to do before the 'phone call. Pushing the lawn mower from one end of the lawn to the other, some 40 metres, when suddenly, I was unable to walk any farther.  I sat down on a nearby chair, after few minutes' long rest began to walk back and this time, I did not last the 40 metres – I had to sit down and rest after less than 10 metres: Angina Pectoris, I diagnosed myself on the spot.

Three months later, after several trips to doctors, cardiologists and hospitals, I was on the operating table…