Readers of this space may recall that I left off last issue with the news that I was going for an open-heart heart surgery, and the promise that I would give a full report of the experience.
I had lots of notice to prepare the farm for my 3-month recovery. I sent the steers out, whittled the sheep flock down, lined up round bales for the neighbour to move and stockpiled bags of feed. I also piled three bush cords of firewood on the veranda and took a picture of it to give the surgeon some baseline data on my abilities going into the procedure. He was impressed enough to be cautious about predicting any kind of improvement in my state.
We all moan about the chaotic state of health care in Canada, but my experience is that if you travel deep into the hive you find the system runs like a Swiss watch. It is just at the edges that wait times, wait lists, elusive specialists and over-burdened GPs give us the impression the system is on the verge of collapse.
I went in on a Thursday morning and emerged that evening with a new valve and a Dacron sleeve around the aneurysm the doctors have been staring at since Stephen Harper was prime minister. I was on my feet the next morning. But because of a few little strokes that affected my speech and vision, they kept me for over a week. The symptoms went away very quickly but they hung onto me out of an ‘abundance of caution.’
I’m not sure if the words ‘small farmer’ were on my chart at the front desk but I was startled to learn that just about everyone on the cardiac ward wants to be one. They were all riding the subway dreaming of that little plot in the forest and here was a guy in front of them who actually owned one. The result was a parade of nurses, cleaners, anesthetists, physiotherapists, and respirologists. Each person wanted me to show them pictures of cows and sheep and dogs and talk about what life was like on the farm. It was like that scene from Of Mice and Men. “Tell me again about the rabbits, George.”
I remember thinking that in my report to the readers I should remind you that whatever gripes you have about your lot in life, you are the envy of a big chunk of the world if you look out over fields and woods and flocks and call the place your own. Practice gratitude.
The only one who expressed no interest at all was the young surgeon who came around three days later for about a minute and a half and announced confidently that I was ‘fixed for life,’ which lifted my spirits. That’s as it should be. I don’t think you want the guy who has your heart out on the shop table in a cloud of WD-40 fumes to be thinking too much about rabbits.
Finally, it was time to say goodbye to the small plot dreamers and return to my own corner of the forest. It’s been two months now of sitting by the fire with my dog and walking around the Walmart in town several times a week for exercise. I am now back behind the snowblower and doing all those romantic small farm chores like thawing pipes and lugging firewood and coaxing the MF 135 diesel engine to life so I can finally move my own bales again. I’m breathing about the same, getting a little more spring in my step every day. I think the operation has been a success.
Imagine my surprise to get a call from the vigorous young man who ran the CAT scan machine at the hospital. He remembered that my lambs would be arriving now and he wanted to come and milk a ewe for colostrum, which back in his native Greece is a spring tonic that cures everything. I wondered if maybe the colostrum would be better placed in the lambs themselves, but he was so excited about it that I couldn’t say no. Besides, I can top the lambs up with the veterinary brand I keep on the shelf. He says he knows how to milk a sheep, because he did it lots of times on his grandfather’s farm back home where they have ten times as many sheep as we do in Canada.
He knows how to make his own feta, too.