May 1, 2016

Dear everyone,

I am writing this letter a day early because I am leaving for Boston tomorrow to go to a three day course on GI pathology (actually, I am skipping out a little early because the end of the course is on liver disease, in which I have no interest or expertise - - luckily, a couple of my colleagues take on liver biopsies).  I hope to see Isaac for dinner one of the evenings I am there.

The main topic of this letter was going to be the Seder dinner at Andy and Gail’s last Saturday on the second day of Passover.  We got there around 5:45 and had some cocktails in the driveway while some additional religious service took place inside.  Then we sat at three separate tables.  Cindy and I were with Andy, Gail, and Rob, Alison, John, and Nancy Feiger.  Nicola and Jasper were at the ‘kids’ table, I think.  The service was a bit long, with many references to Russian Jews in the Soviet Union in the Haggadah.  But we all had a lot of fun telling our ancient story, and Gail cooked a yummy meal of brisket (35 lbs!), chicken Marbella (which I since learned is pronounced Spanish style not Italian [e.g. mar-bay-a, not mar-bell-a]), spicy squash, gefilte fish, matzo, horseradish, etc.  We finished off the meal with Israeli grapefruit arak. Everything was delicious, and Andy and Gail were so gracious to host two nights of parties of 35 people.

However, the main story appears to be a fall that Roger had late Friday night.  Roger was in Phoenix AZ for tennis camp, and he fell down a flight of stairs.  The injuries were serious enough that he was brought to one ER, and then transferred to an ICU at a more advanced hospital. The hospital tried to call Barbara at home in the early hours of the morning with all of this information, but her phone wasn’t properly in the cradle, and did not ring.  They got hold of Gail at 4 AM (Andy was in New Orleans), and she went over to Barbara’s house, but didn’t disturb her until around 5-6. She tried to text Cindy and me, but we astutely don’t bring our cells phones upstairs in ordinary circumstances, so we didn’t know anything until about 7:45.  I have yet to actually speak to a physician in Arizona, although I have been in communication with several of the ICU nurses, as well as Roger, who sounds pretty feisty.  As I understand it, Roger has some fracturing of his facial bones.  More alarming was a possible brain hemorrhage (subdural?). I think this might be why he was transferred to the ICU of the other hospital.  However, subsequent CTs have shown, so far, resolution of the bleed, and Roger will probably be transferred to a step-down unit this evening and likely discharged tomorrow. An unanswered question so far is when it will be safe for him to travel home, and whether he should do this on his own.  We don’t have answers to these questions.  Luckily, Owen is in San Francisco, heading back to Minneapolis, and perhaps it will end up that he diverts his trip home with pit stops in Phoenix and Chicago.

Update Sunday AM

The neurosurgeon finally reached me last night around 8:45.  He thought the initial CT scan that purported to show a brain bleed was probably over called.  Subsequent CTs have been negative; although, Roger should probably get another one in 2-4 weeks to make sure he doesn’t have a chronic subdural hemorrhage. He will  also need to see a plastic facial surgeon; he definitely has some small fractures.  He also suffered a concussion during his fall. The plan was to get Roger discharged this morning, and for him to fly back to Chicago on Monday, as scheduled, with his fellow tennis players, with Gail and Barbara to arrange wheelchair pick-up and delivery at the two airports.

What else?  Cindy and I just rented and saw Birdman, with Michael Keaton.  This is a meta-movie about Keaton (who years ago played, successfully, as Batman, and then left the franchise) starring as an older actor who years ago played a batman-like comic book character.  His character writes produces directs and acts in a Broadway play based on a novel by Raymond Carver.  It won several big Oscars, justly for cinematography - - it has many long, claustrophobic and somewhat nauseating tracking shots.  The ending is ambiguous, and apparently the writers took a lot of liberties with Carver’s story.  It is worth a rental, though, but I liked the Grand Budapest Hotel more.

Love, H.