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Nov 6, 2008 - 02:07 AM |
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This Isn't Supposed to be the Psych Ward. |
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I am in a section of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center that's dedicated to pre and post-transplant care. This section contains heart and lung patients. Many of us are tethered to monitoring devices, I.V. poles and other machinery. If shit gets real, that's a lot of baggage. I'm more mobile than most. I can disconnect a couple wires and tubes, then bolt if I must. One should hope this never becomes necessary, naturally.
Laying mostly asleep in my hospital room, moments ago, I was awakened by a loud clatter. Something in the nearby hallway had fallen. People were yelling. I had a family member bring me a fan to drown out the usual disturbances, so hearing this was quite alarming. There had been other incidents in which cardiac patients had required immediate help, I'd heard what that sounded like. This was very different, it felt very wrong for the usual emergency situation.
I could hear the immediate responses of other patients, to open their doors and see what the story was. The staff was quick to loudly demand that they close their doors. This was the message I gathered, though the words were unclear due to my fan.
I got up, turned the fan off and just listened. A man was furious. At first, it sounded to me like a patient was complaining of perceived abuses, but the whole tone was darker, more urgent. I can't tell but it was tense enough to believe that something seriously wrong had been attempted, or done, such as negligence leading to patient death, or murder. People were screaming, arguing. The one man with the African-American sounding voice was shouting "I kill dudes like you!" A woman named Angela was told to get right back where she was.
There were a lot of people speaking at once, so it was difficult to make out the sequence of events. It was heavy arguing between the African American voice and one of the floor staffers. The conversation had the ebb and flow of a negotiation sequence, one in which a person attempts to talk another down out of a manic state. A statement of "showing off for 30 people" came into play, making it sound vaguely gang-related. And someone else, an older voice, yelling about a tracheotomy.
This went on for about seven or eight minutes, a sort of Mexican standoff near my doorway. The African American voice was very agitated, very angry. I could hear the approaching sound of radios, signalling the arrival of some kind of security force. The tone outside became more subdued within moments, and soon there was mild laughter. The African American voice disappeared.
There was a lot of shuffling around of equipment and such, following this. I couldn't hear much of anything. A man with a two-way handheld suggested closing off the floor from outsiders, I think. Shortly thereafter, I could hear a male nurse, the one who'd been involved in much of the arguing, trying to settle the patient across the hall. He asked if the light should remain on, then gave an assurance that "that guy's not coming back here."
I have a vivid imagination, so I need to be wary about envisioning the worst possible scenario here. But based upon all the input, it seems like something very dangerous happened right outside my door, maybe even gang-related.
An hour before this happened, I had a very vivid dream. A curious side-effect of anti-rejection medication is that the adjustment period often brings with it some peculiar mental issues. Hallucinations, schizophrenia, violent mood swings, nightmares, personality disorders - these are all common. They're thankfully temporary. You cannot predict who will receive which, and I got hallucinations and nightmares.
The dream was relatively mundane until the section in which I, my father, and several folk from my neighborhood at home, came upon a mysterious, glowing, blue light. Upon further inspection, it appeared to be a small alien vessel that had been grounded with technical difficulties. But as we approached, we found ourselves glowing also, and I could feel the pulsing. When someone moved too near, it triggered an auto-destruct sequence that levitated the craft off the ground, into the atmosphere above, radiation growing in size and intensity. A skull image became visible in the maelstrom, then as it reached its zenith and was as large in the sky as our own Sun, it exploded forth, sending out twisting waves of destructive energy. As they bathed over the planet's surface, I could see and feel all matter, and seemingly reality itself, break its bonds as the concentric waves of the explosion literally dissolved everything in its path, before my rapidly waning eyesight. All objects were being pulled apart at their most subatomic levels. And I could sense the collective shock and terror of over seven billion souls as the consciousness of each was laid thin among the fabric of space in an instant, a final state of desperate self-awareness before nothingness took over - at which point I snapped awake with an elevated heartbeat and what must've been an expression of purest confusion.
But between seeing the earth's molecular demise and a possible homicide only ten feet away, I doubt I'll be sleeping much for the rest of the night.
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