Iowa Harvest Time

September 30, 2012

OK, I was just reading an earlier blog where I said, “Can you believe that we have been here almost 10 WEEKS, well now, we can say that can you believe that we have been here almost 10 MONTHS!! October 5^th will be the 10 month anniversary?????? I hope that we won’t have to say, “Wow, we have been here 10 years waiting!” Waiting, waiting, waiting – we did have another “false alarm” about two weeks ago – the nurse called that there was a liver for Charlie and that she would call back shortly with the room.  When she called back, and as she was giving me the room number, the surgeon walked in where she was and announced that the family had decided not to donate the organ! Seriously????????? (If you haven’t talked with your family about your wishes about Organ Donation please do so now and get it down in writing!)

Just a little info – you can go to unos.org, which is the national registry for organ donation. On that, you will see that as of today, that there are 115,827 people waiting for transplants!! 73,877 are on the “Active list” – the difference is that candidates can be placed on the inactive list for health conditions which would make surgery impossible temporarily.  If you are interested, you can then click on transplant and get all sorts of info. We are in District 8 and Charlie is O negative.  You can even get down to the transplant centers. I check it all out frequently!! But…..do give a thought to being an organ donor. From one donor in May (when Charlie was actually in the hospital waiting for the transplant) the doctors were able to use the lungs, heart, kidneys and a liver of one donor! 6 people have a future from that!! Please give it some thought and also talk to your friends and family! It is a matter of life and death for many people.

We had a fun visit with Meg and Lucy a couple of weeks ago – our set up here makes it such a fun playground for kids! You walk out of the hotel/apartment complex and you are on the pedestrian mall with playground equipment, fountains, library, and space to RUN! Lucy would take off running from the door…..where else can you just run and run in a downtown setting? We went to a pumpkin farm, saw Charlotte’s Web at the Children’s Museum, had a picnic at a state park, and just had so much fun. We hadn’t see Lucy since February! It is always hard to see family leave.

The fall coloring is gorgeous now – we are having those crisp, sunny, warm days and it is just beautiful. Last Thursday we drove over to the Mississippi River at Muscatine and then followed the River Road up to Davenport and then back here. It was a beautiful outing!

We miss you all!

Hot August Nites

September 4, 2012

Well, why yes we are still in Iowa and yes we are still waiting – 9 months tomorrow we’ve been here! We have to admit that we are starting to get a little bummed at times and want to go HOME! After a time of this, then we realize again how fortunate we are, but really, isn’t it about time?????

We did have another “call” last Wednesday – we were attending a matinee at a theater out at Amana and just as it was starting we got a call from the hospital telling us that they had a liver for Charlie and that we needed to come immediately! So we, along with my brother and wife, headed back to Iowa City. About half way back, we got another call saying don’t come right away just wait until we call you – “the doctor had some things to sort out yet with the organ.” So we waited and waited and finally we found out that it was a “no go!” Needless, to say, we were really upset! What a roller coaster of emotions we are on….. We just need to keep reminding ourselves that the “right one” for Charlie will come along!!

I had a fun visit with four dear school friends – 3 from Des Moines and one who lives in MN. They came for lunch and then we had a great time playing cards. It has been a big bonus being able to catch up with these friends – we have known each other for hum, can I say, over 60 years!! Marty, who lives in MN, and I started to kindergarten together!

We really love this apartment and the space we have is just amazing after spending 8 months in a hotel room! We have gotten some flowers so Charlie has his “garden” to take care of….we will include a picture! Our patio is really quite large – 40 feet by almost 8 feet.

Charlie has been feeling much better the last couple of weeks – all things considered! We are very thankful for this. He is scheduled for another endoscopy next week. The last 2 of these have not required any banding of varices which was good. Hopefully, this will be the same!

This weekend will be the first home football game – the big rival game with Iowa State University and, from what everyone tells us, the town explodes with people and excitement.

By the way, we did get to go back Sunday to Amana and see the play that we had to leave – it was:  “A Second Helping: The Church Basement Ladies Sequel. It was inspired by a book, “Growing up Lutheran” by Greta Crosch. It was hilarious – and sure reminded me of when I was growing up Lutheran in Des Moines and all of our events in the church basement.

As always, we miss you all and hope to be back in California by Christmas……..?????????