SUNDAY AFTERNOON . SAME PLACE
After five days, Colleen busted out of her room today. She got a one-hour hall pass from Nurse Liz, who took pity on us and tacked on an extra 15 minutes, which we were strictly instructed not to exceed. We used every minute and got back just before curfew. Col wanted to see the "old" section of the hospital--which includes only three standing buildings of the original twelve that were built in the late 1800s. We both remarked the beauty of the dark wood wainscotting and doors, the marble floors, framed oil portraits of Johns Hopkins and the earliest medical staff, a five-story balconied rotunda with a domed glass ceiling, ornate brass lamps polished gold, and green-patina copper ornamentation on the upper exterior windows and roof. It wasn't difficult at all to envision doctors and nurses dressed and coiffed in 19th century style walking briskly down these very halls. I wished I could time-travel back to see them with my own eyes.

We happened upon a patio with an ideal view of one of the three historic buildings and where Colleen got to sit in the sun until time was up. White clouds traversed blue sky above us. I turned my face upward
and wondered who was enjoying this more, me or Col, now sleeping.

5 PM . OMG . SAME PLACE
Eternity has nothing on this endless Sunday. It has rendered Colleen and me zombie-like, in spite of "getting out" earlier for 105 minutes. Colleen has just finished her upteenth Lasix IV--losing altogether since being here 4 quarts-plus of fluid. She still has a ways to go on a two-hour magnesium drip through her other IV port. And that's about it. 

We should, I suppose, feel good that Colleen's Wagnerian Opera is on hiatus today. But we're both finding it difficult to read, to screen anything, to alight on any whisper of peace. Even Nurse Liz is soporific today. The entire ward is somnolent. The late afternoon sun outside the window fails to beckon. I deduce we have a case of the lonesome hospital blues.

We expect tomorrow will arrive like an inbound train, but no sign of anything on the length of empty tracks yet.