Check it out. The Hobbit Trailer.
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Nice to turn some thoughts away from the hospital for a moment to muse on you all and our Thanksgiving tradition. I trust you all have much to be thankful for, and that the holiday is great.
We are doing well the last two days, and are now out of the ICU. Today, the last of Griffin’s various tubes and wires came off, so it feels monumental and freeing. We may be discharged as soon as Friday, it sounds like. So, indeed, we are thankful and glad, and have appreciated all your friendship and support and good thoughts and words. The last weeks, and especially the last two weeks, have been hard ones.
In so many ways this has been an extraordinary year, and as the holidays approach and take us in, I hope to muse on that with you all soon.
Happy Thanksgiving.
I know Jeff is going through a tough time with Griffin right now, and I know many of us are preoccupied with parenthood and other things, but Sara and I watched this on PBS, and I think it’s well worth the fifty-odd minutes it takes to watch it, if you haven’t. Here’s the link.
![34788_490446422678_25847057678_5707308_7250921_n[1]](https://i0.wp.com/www.wearethehollowmen.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/34788_490446422678_25847057678_5707308_7250921_n1.jpg "34788_490446422678_25847057678_5707308_7250921_n[1]")
I have a bit of news that I need to share. Jen and I brought our seven-month-old Griffin in on Friday for a procedure to look into his throat. He has had croup and has suffered a lingering lack of breath the last few weeks.
They discovered that he has congenital subglottic stenosis— essentially, he is rapidly outgrowing his windpipe. They are recommending surgery and suggesting we do it soon, as his windpipe is the size of a preemie, which may result in an emergency airway restriction. So we need to avoid that, and hope to avoid a tracheotomy.
From what we understand so far, they will take tissue from his ribcage and reconstruct a larger airway for him. Then, he’ll need to be sedated for five days and stay in the ICU. Then he will need up to two to three weeks for recovery, as he rebuilds strength and muscle after being under anaesthesia for so long. So we’re expecting to be in the hospital for most of November.
We’re letting this news sink in and also feeling grateful that we live in a time and a place where this is “fixable” and he can go on to lead a normal life. We have a lot to be grateful for, and we’re hopeful.
We do not yet know when they need to perform the surgery, but will be talking with the surgeon on Monday. He suggested “sooner rather than later.” The surgery will be done at Children’s Hospital, and we feel we’re in the best medical hands we can be. They have performed this surgery over 500 times, we’re told, and in Griffin’s case, success rate is high.
Thanks for any good thoughts you can give us. I will report in as we know more.
Jeff
Just dreaming out loud here for a moment. There has been far too much time between visits and get togethers over the past couple of years. Understandable, of course. I am wondering what holiday plans might look like and if we dare dream up a kid-a-palooza event for somewhere down the road. There are too many great kiddos out there now with no real knowledge of the others. Perhaps we could plan something for next summer. i know a place in the mountains that may have enough space and may be cost-effective…just sayin’
She was defiantly independent, unbelievably loyal, tender with our kids, and territorial. She was living proof that you CAN teach an old dog new tricks, as she got smarter and smarter the longer she lived, learning to communicate what she wanted more and more efficiently. She hated getting wet. She protected Eliot and Sara from a raging pitbull, and I slept sitting up with her when she couldn’t lie down from the pain of the injuries she had sustained in the fight. When I came home from the vet after learning that she had advanced lymphoma, my family was gone and she licked the tears from my face. The night before last, she couldn’t climb the stairs to go out at night to go to the bathroom, and I carried her up. Later that night, I found she had climbed the stairs to my bedroom to be beside me during a storm. She was a fighter and stubborn, and one of my best friends. Dogs are a marvel. And I miss her very much.
Agnes September 1999 – July 2011
I managed to see the final installment of the Harry Potter films last night, and figured that nothing has lit up the blog in the past quite like debating Potter, the books, the films, the cultural relevance of the series. So, why not employ the Resurrection Stone and bring this conversation back.
I’ll let this general subject stand, and comment below with hope to hear some of you chime in, if you’ve seen the new move or not.
I managed to draw J.E.’s attention to the post of a recent image created to mark the anniversary of the Deep Horizon oil spill in the gulf so I thought I’d post the others. I made more than this, but these were the ones I decided to go with. I called the series No Horizon as both a reference to the rig that collapsed, but also to the fact that they have no real environment or background, which is unusual for my work. The Bluefin and the Loggerhead turtle images were made with oil and water and ink, and the birds were made with ink, water and soap suds. Obviously, the materials were important in the creation of this series. The names are tentative.
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Here’s the first in a series dedicated to the BP spill. This image was created with ink, oil, and water (and Photoshop). The initial splotch was created, incidentally, in a sketchbook given to me by Toby.
Here we all are. Happy Father’s Day to all of you.
This is a new image in the TINAW series, one of three digital works I am constructing. Before I took the trouble to post it to my website, I thought I’d get your input.
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