June 11, 2020. My eighty year old father, Carlo Portoghese, is in Winthrop Hospital in New York. He was admitted last Tuesday because of a fever and upon finding out he had a staff infection has been there since. He has tested negative for Covid19 three times. He has had several tests (MRI, Bone scan, Lung scan and TEE) in order to find the origin of the infection initially found in his blood. The antibiotics have brought the fever down and he is responding well to them. After his final test results last night and with all tests coming back negative he will have a PICC line put in and be able to come home.
Today my mom celebrates her eightieth birthday and it will be nice when they can finally be together again.
Maren and I were married this day seventeen years ago in Maui, HI. The ceremony took place on a beach in Kihei near the home of Tim and Scarlet DeShong, who happen to be visiting us on their drive back home to Maine. They were in Florence Oregon for a closing on property once owned by Tim’s dad who recently passed away. It is great having them here to celebrate with us.
Tuesday was the funeral and burial of George Floyd. His death has brought about weeks of protests and riots and in time will bring change to policing procedures and the ill treatment of the black community by white police officers. During the funeral service, held in Houston, Brooke Williams, a niece of George Floyd, gave an emotion-filled speech. Ending with this statement, "Someone said, 'Make America Great Again,' but when has America ever been great?" she asked." She has a point. Through the eyes of a black community, once enslaved and forever discriminated against, when has it ever been great? During a time when the most effective leader and speaker for civil rights, Martin Luther King Jr., was being heard and progress was a real possibility; he was assassinated. It proved too much and progress was halted. Racism and death once again went hand in hand. Not since 1968 has there been a charismatic leader likened to MLK. When in the middle of a pandemic and worldwide health crisis, a 46 year old man and his death by a white police officer in an act of white power and/or racism (read how racism is defined in the dictionary then decide... prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior.) could be the catalyst that brings Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream to reality. His words, "I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”
Even as a pandemic has shaken the world to it's core and forced an economic shutdown and kept people in their homes the protests go on so the dream may live.
I also visited the hospital for the first time since the pandemic. It was very sterile and I was in for an x-ray and examination of my elbow. The prognosis is medial and lateral epicondylitis.
No comments:
Post a Comment