“No sickness is allowed,” I told the family. Usually everyone obeys. Exceptions do occur. I anticipated pain and misery the week my octogenarian husband had a couple teeth pulled.
On surgery day, we left early to compensate for road repairs and school buses. We encountered neither. We arrived almost an hour early. The staff processed and called him back early. I went to the van to tip back, read, do needlework and enjoy a snack. I barely finished my snacks and the second chapter, when the doctor called, “Time to pick him up at the back door. I ordered pain medication. He just needs to take it easy. He will sleep a lot.”
Hubby stood like a puppet on loose strings. The nurse slid him into the passenger’s seat. He melted into place, leaned back and closed his eyes. With a mouthful of gauze he resorted to hand signals to direct us home.
A bit later, as we neared a thrift store I had not visited in a while, I looked at him, “Will you be okay if I pop in to see if they have any Bibles or Christian literature?”
He mumbled something, waved his hand and closed his eyes. I rolled down the windows and left.
With the sale price of 20 books for a dollar, I filled the buggy with New Testaments, Bibles, commentaries and children’s books. I quietly loaded them into the car where he still slept. I decided since he slept, I had time to explore household items.
Twenty minutes later I emerged with an armful of fabric and a dirty but working sewing machine. I said nothing as I tucked them beside the boxes of books. I may collect Christian literature for Love Packages in Illinois, but fabric and sewing machines take longer to catch and release.
The patient slept while I went to get his pain medication. When I returned, he wanted to go to a Bible Study.
“Do you need a pain pill before you go?” I asked.
“No. I’m fine.” Afterwards someone commented, ‘He didn’t talk very much.”
“Well, he had his mouth filled with gauze,” I explained.
The bag of medication remained closed. The next day, he rested in his chair and ate yogurt before going to the prayer lunch of food he could not eat.
He might not be able to chew food, but he could still help. I handed him a scorched iron that evening, “Can you clean up the gunk on the bottom? It is leaving spots on the fabric. Oh, and by the way, how do you feel?”
“I’m okay,” he said as gathered bottles of cleaners and began scrubbing. Nothing worked except a razor blade and fine sand paper. I thought the iron looked great. He said, “I have some super fine sanding cloth used after painting cars. I can use it.” When the iron looked brand new, he kicked back and rested without any pain medication.
On the third day, he added Jell-O to his diet and worked on papers at the table. That evening I put the fabric away and took the machine out from behind his chair. Time to clean it and see how it worked.
The bobbin and case stubbornly refused to separate. I took out the whole mechanism and handed it to my still recuperating handyman. He pried them apart.
“The bobbin is too large,” he said. I found a 1/64th of an inch smaller bobbin in my extras. I cleaned out a wad of lint from the machine, tested the decorative stitches and reverse button. All worked except a few stitches seemed off.
“This part is worn,” he pointed at the exposed gears.
He loosened the wheel for me and asked, “where did you get this machine?”
“At that thrift store,” I said mentally adding, “while you were asleep.”
He removed some rust from the wheel and studied the machine, “The bobbin winder and top thread guides look like it was dropped. They are bent. I can fix that.” He reached for pliers and adjusted everything. He may still be eating soft food, but he’s not doing too badly for a guy I thought would sit in the lounge chair moaning in pain for days. However, he has always been the fixer and never the one to break anything, not even the house rule against sickness.