1 result for (book:deavf1 AND heading:"essay 1 thursday april 1 1982" AND stemmed:alon)
[... 9 paragraphs ...]
I should note, by the way, that her bedsores weren’t infected when she went into the hospital, but were less than a week later. How come? “It’s staph,” several of the nurses told us. A sign warning of infection was put on the door of 3B9, Jane’s room, and stayed there until she went home. “If the infection in that ulcer on your coccyx reaches the bone, it means at least a six-week stay in the hospital,” exclaimed Jane’s principal doctor, Rita Mandali (not her real name). Twice-daily treatments with hydrogen peroxide and a sulfadiazine cream were started. And I began to read up on how many kinds of staphylococcus bacteria alone there are, and indeed how common infections are in hospitals, since by their very nature those institutions are far from being the cleanest in town….
[... 27 paragraphs ...]
I liked practically all of the doctors and nurses and orderlies, and they liked me. Most of them didn’t know or care “who I was.” Very few were familiar with my work (although a few local fans—strangers—eventually found their way to my hospital room). I found I could hold my own in that environment that at first had seemed so alien. I learned to joke even as my backside swung perilously above the commode, while I hoped that its aim was true in the hands of the nurses and orderlies—and again I felt that long-forgotten camaraderie with people, and a growth within myself apart from my work, or what I did. I had a right to be on earth because I’d been born here like every other physical creature, and on that level alone I was part of a great framework of physical energy and cooperation.
[... 5 paragraphs ...]