An Excerpt from Chapter One of Flashes of Light: How to reboot your life, your business or both when chaos strikes by Ann M. Babiarz, as told to Michael A. Babiarz

Creative Consultant: K. Lee — Editor: Annamaria Farbizio

©2015 by Ann M. Babiarz and Michael A. Babiarz, J.D., all rights reserved (see notice below)

Chapter 1: In the Beginning (part 9)

The flight with my mother, and sisters Deb and Denise, touched down at Southwest Florida International Airport almost simultaneously with my parole from the hospital. Securing a rental car, they navigated their way to my home, arriving an hour or so after I did. I barely had time to make myself presentable for their entrance. During my several day stint in the hospital, I didn’t even have a sponge bath. A shower felt great, and returned me to a more normal existence. Under the watchful eyes of my husband, instructed to be sure that I did’t slip, fall and hit my head, I scraped layers of sweat, hospital gels and goop, and dirt from every corner I could reach. Despite many a man’s prurient fantasies, this was not an erotic scene. One more humiliation remained, and was to stay for some time; no blade razors for my skin. I borrowed one of Michael’s old electric shavers and hacked away as best I could. 

The doorbell rang, and a delivery service dropped off a lovely arrangement of flowers. These were from Dr. Hasen, an aesthetic plastic surgeon, and his team. I had a facial scheduled with his aesthetician. I called to cancel. Poor LeAnn answered, listening to my tale of woe with a compassionate ear. I almost felt worse for her hearing my story as telling it. But I appreciated the get-well bouquet. It touched me.

Touched and thrilled would not adequately describe my reunion with Mom, Deb and Denise. True, during childhood my sisters tormented me as older sibs do growing up, but there was also a lot of love and warmth. And even as an adult, I still wanted my mommy. Don’t we all?

All devoured celebratory takeout pizza, for me a grand improvement over institutional food. I’m sure Michael didn’t mind replacing the ham and cheese snack shop sandwiches he’d been existing on for the past several days with something a bit more tasty.

The five of us spent the next couple of days relaxing, and taking a few drives around the area. Visiting the Naples pier, seeing the scenery, and showing off the beauty of our little paradise made me happy. My speech and handwriting bettered day by day.

Workaholic that I was at this point, I sat down at my computer to check e-mail and log on to my website. I could not remember the password to my system. I entered this identifier several times a day before my stroke. Moreover, typing on a computer revealed numerous errors afflicting my normal fluid keystroking skill.

Another curious effect of this hospitalization involved my dogs. Carl, my male greyhound, greeted me with his usual exuberant affect. Willy, on the other hand, sniffed me and kept her distance. Was it the stench of the hospital still offending her sensitive nose? Or did she sense something else amiss with me?

Despite this, the visit from my peeps passed pleasantly and altogether too fast. We sat out in the lanai, enjoying the temperate weather, no doubt feeling really good to my winter-weary sisters and mother, playing word games and puzzles. Even Mom, conservative by nature, and Catholic through and through, couldn’t stop laughing when I spelled out some of my seven naughty words as plays in a board game. After all, Mom and Dad raised me in a strict yet loving household. On one particular occasion, my younger brother Dennis and I teased our oldest brother Steve as we were all watching television. We repeatedly chided Steve over and over about having a brown spot on his pants (he didn’t, but this is a very effective way of tormenting an older sibling) until Mom grabbed us both. It was the one and only time that I actually had my mouth washed out with soap as a child, although I’m sure I deserved it more often!

By now, my speech regained most family names; my youngest brother Derek remained “Breve”, obviously a totally nonsensical word. When asked to recite my mother’s first name, instead of Agnes, I smiled and brightly replied “Mom!”

Though impossible to repay my sisters and mother for their support, as a small token, I decided to give them copies of a book I recently published on spirituality.1 Tears welled up in my eyes as I struggled to affix inscriptions onto the title page of each. I’m not sure if the emotions came from the words I wanted to say to each, or the failure of my hand to place those words upon the page.

Read more of Chapter One in our next posting — blog posts entered Mondays and Thursdays. For information on the book, please visit: flashes of light.

©2015 by Ann M. Babiarz and Michael A. Babiarz, J.D., all rights reserved

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