Past His Prime

I dislike shopping in general and I especially dislike shopping for clothes.  And yet I found myself online dress shopping at 5:00 am this morning.

 

Gary woke me up around 2:30 because he wanted to go the hospital.  He thought he may be having a heart attack or a stroke but couldn’t really explain what was wrong other than he didn’t feel right.  When I tried to get some clarification on what that meant, he said he felt “blah” and “past [his] prime.”

 

As I scurried around getting dressed, he decided he did not want to go to the hospital after all.  I checked his glucose and that was normal, as was his blood pressure and temperature.  Still, he maintained something was seriously wrong.  More serious than just being “past his prime.”  When I pressed him on why he didn’t want to go the hospital, he said we would have to call the fire department to help put him in the car.  When I told him we could skip that step by calling an ambulance, he said he was worried they would take him to the crappy local hospital instead of the good hospital 45 minutes away.  When I reminded him we have successfully persuaded them to take him to the good hospital in the past, he said he preferred to die at home.

 

So there it is.  And there I stood, unsure of what to do.  I wanted to call the ambulance but I was worried he would send them away once they arrived and, if death was imminent, I certainly wanted to honor his wishes.  But if it was a stroke or a heart attack that wasn’t going to kill him, he really needed to go to the hospital.  I offered to call a friend who is a PA but he said there was no point in waking her because she was going to tell us to go to the ER (he’s probably correct and, Jessica if you’re reading this, you can thank him for letting you sleep because I already had my finger on the “call” button).  After more than a little bit of arguing and pleading, I made the anguished decision to stay home and wait. 

And wait. 

And wait.

 

Eventually, he drifted off to sleep but I was unable to do the same which is how I found myself online shopping for dresses at 5:00 AM.  Black dresses.  Because as I sat there wondering if he was going to die, I naturally started worst-case scenario planning and realized I don’t really have anything appropriate to wear to his funeral.  And that gave me something to concrete to focus on – a problem I could solve.  Even if he survives the night (spoiler alert: he did), I need to buy a black dress and I can’t go dress shopping because I can’t leave the house.

 

But then he mentioned again he was past his prime and that reminded me Amazon has 2-day free shipping.