Birthday Flowers

Ah, hospitals.

I don’t much care for hospitals. I don’t suppose anyone does. I couldn’t say that I dislike them more than most folks, ‘cause I can’t read minds, but my dislike of them is pretty profound, if uninformed. I never get sick myself, you see; I have arthritis in my knees, and I occasionally get major hangovers, but outside of that I’m perfectly healthy and always have been.

What this means is that not only do I dislike hospitals, I also have a very limited experience of them, and don’t really understand how they operate. So, it was with some trepidation that, after I got off work last night, I walked down to St. Mary’s for visiting hours.

The last time I was in a hospital was when Rhonda, my former lover, had her surgery several years ago. The surgery lasted six hours, and I was a little bit frantic, constantly running out to smoke and then running back in and questioning staff members to make sure nothing had happened while I was outside.

When the surgery was done, some doctor or nurse or hospital employee of some kind came out and told me, “She’s fine, and we’re getting ready to move her up to room 819,” or whatever the room number was; I don’t remember. Anyway, he said I could go up and wait for her there. So I did, of course. And waited. And waited.

After an hour or a little more, I decided “Fuck this.” I was starting to think they’d done something with her, like I had fallen into a Robin Cook novel or something. So I thought, "Well, I’ll just search the hospital for her, then." And I did; I started where I’d last seen her and turned the hospital upside-down, basically, and I eventually found her after causing a great deal of consternation. Also, I threatened to take one of the orderlies outside and kick his ass because I didn’t like the way he was maneuvering her little trolley-bed thing. I woulda done it, too. He had a bad attitude.

I had a lot of trouble with the hospital staff over the course of Rhonda’s stay, actually. She’s a very sweet girl, and I’m sure the staff grew fond of her while she was there, but I would still bet they were glad when she left, ‘cause it meant I was going, too.

Anyway, so yeah, me and hospitals have a short but bitter history. I am alarmed by them; the obsessive cleanliness that comes alongside an inexplicable and unwholesome smell, the horrible-looking food on those mobile bookcases, the fact that they’re always cold make me a little bit uneasy, a feeling to which my natural reaction is extreme bitchiness. This, combined with the lack of trust I’m willing to place in some nobody (degree or not, if I don’t know you and believe in you, you’re a nobody) who is “caring for” someone I love, and the lack of interest I have in hiding this lack of trust, combine to make me a very difficult hospital visitor.

I reflected on all this as I started the long walk yesterday. But just as I began, the sun came out and it got warmer, and I thought of the excellent person I was going to see, and my mood lightened. I was still preoccupied, but a bit less…I don’t know. Angsty. Whatever.

I sang to myself, as I do when I walk; and I stopped by Kroger’s to buy a rose to bring along as a present. The song I was singing to myself as I stood in line to pay for the flower was Concrete Blonde’s “Happy Birthday”:

Smoking out the window
Feeling far away
News on the radio
Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday, Happy Birthday

The woman in front of me in line noticed this and, being friendly, asked, “So, who’s the lucky birthday girl?”

This, of course, is a perfectly logical question. In fact, it’s kind of a Sherlock Holmesian bit of deduction. I’m buying nothing except a single flower and singing a song in which the words “Happy Birthday” figure prominently. It makes sense that she’d assume that I was buying a birthday flower for someone, and it would be reasonable to assume that that person was a woman (though I love roses myself, no one ever buys them for me...I guess men aren't supposed to like flowers).

Unfortunately, my mind wasn’t working that way yesterday. I wasn’t paying attention to the song I was singing; it emerged randomly from my subconscious, and might as well have been “Honky Tonk Women” or “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” which I’d like to see how she would have reacted to those.

So I stared at her in confusion for a second, and then said something along the lines of “What?”

“Who,” she repeated slowly, “is the pretty girl getting the birthday flower?”

I still had no idea what she was talking about. Once my mind heads down a particular path, it’s kinda hard for me to make it change directions, and the significance of the song still had not impressed itself upon me. But at least she’d explained that she was talking about the flower. And one thing I definitely knew was who the flower was for.

“No, there’s no pretty girl. Well, I mean, there is…a very beautiful girl, in fact, but it isn’t her birthday. It’s nobody’s birthday. Well, nobody important, anyway. I mean, as far as I know. Tomorrow,” I hit on this happy but essentially unrelated fact for reasons that are not clear to me, “tomorrow is Whit’s birthday. But I don’t actually know her. I mean, I do, but we’ve never met. Do you know her?” She looked at me as if the flower was growing out of my forehead rather than resting in my hand. “Well, whose birthday,” I asked her, “is it supposed to be?”

“How should I know?” By this time, I think, she was sorry she’d said anything. “You’re the one buying a flower and saying ‘Happy Birthday’ over and over.”

“Oh, it’s nobody’s birthday. I just like that song.”

And then she walked away. Rather more rapidly than one would expect, and occasionally glancing over her shoulder at me.

And I, very happy at having (however accidentally) sown a little more confusion in the world, paid for my flower and went on towards the hospital.

The rose and I made friends over the remainder of the journey. It rode in my bag, but I had its head poking out so it could breathe, and it bobbed along next to me, just in my line of sight. I discovered, while walking, that rather than singing, or talking to myself, which are the ways I usually pass the time on a long walk, I was talking to the flower itself. Well, and answering for it, because flowers, you know, they don’t actually talk.

Also, the sex of the flower changed while we walked. When I’d first walked into the Kroger flower department, I’d just grabbed the first single long-stemmed red rose I’d seen. But then I’d glanced down and noticed this far more lovely rose. “Oh, no, pretty girl,” I said to it, “I like you much better,” and put the first one back to grab the one I ended up buying. But as we walked I found myself referring to the rose as “Little Brother” and “My Clever Boy.” I don’t know what the Freudian significance of that is.

What I do know is this: once I can afford it, I’m gonna start buying myself a fresh long-stemmed red rose every morning, to carry around poking its little head out of the top of my bag every day. I really liked the way it looked while we were walking together yesterday. Besides, it’s good company and stops me talking to myself, which, let’s be honest, I shouldn’t do as much of as I actually do.

The rest of the trip was uneventful, except for the homeless guy who seemed to want to make friends, possibly on the basis of the relationship I’d struck up with the rose. He followed me from Third Avenue to Fifth Avenue and into Kroger’s, where I thought I’d lost him, but he picked me back up outside, followed me back to Third Avenue ‘til about…27th or 28th Street, probably. Then he finally just kinda peeled off on his own. He hadn’t said a word. It was a good relationship, really, ‘cause I didn’t have to give him a cigarette. And, as I’ve said many times, the problem with this town is that everybody smokes but no one except me ever actually BUYS cigarettes.

The hospital grounds have many conflicting and misleading signs, and after walking an hour and a half to get there I wasn’t happy about being led on a wild goose chase trying to find the right door. But the staff was actually surprisingly kind and helpful, and maybe I’ll have to revise my opinion of these people, or at least the ones at St. Mary’s. And my visit was wonderful; she loved my rose, and she loved the books I brought her to read to pass the time, and she loves me too, and I made her happy. So, it was a good trip, and a beautiful night, and I’m still feeling great joy and peace from it. Love to all, and to one in particular.