“He’s got smoke in there.”
“Smoke? What? Where?” When my cute Japanese DIL gets emotional, her translation sometimes falters, and now I was trying to grasp what she was telling me. My son had contacted me yesterday morning to say that his visiting father-in-law, who is 84, was at the hospital emergency room, not feeling well at all. Yo was calling to give me an update.
“Ummm...there,” she repeated. I could picture her pointing, which did me no good at all on this land phone. Then she found the English word for it. “Smoke in his lungs.”
“But he never smoked.” I answered, wondering.
“No, no Mom! Not smoke, that’s not the word. But like fog, you know? In the x-ray they saw fog in his lungs.” She was beginning to sound frustrated from not being able to remember the right term. I’m not that knowledgeable about medical situations, but I remembered my son saying there was high fever, and weakness...and now ‘fog’ in the X-ray....
“Pneumonia?” I guessed.
“Yes, yes, Mom! That’s the thing they said. Thank you, Mom!” I could hear the ‘whoosh’ of relief in her voice; we were understanding each other.
He’s on antibiotics, and the doctor said lots of rest, so Yo’s agenda to show them the whole province of Quebec in 4 weeks has been scrapped. It’s actually a blessing in disguise; this way they get more quiet moments to enjoy and cuddle their granddaughter, Miko. Although my DIL is slightly disappointed, she now realizes that her plans were more for a younger set. Her parents have passed that age. She doesn’t see them often – once every two years or so – and accepting that they are getting on in years can make this time all the more precious.
My son texted me last night that Ojiisan is feeling better; the antibiotics seem to be doing the job. They had planned on coming up to visit me here on Thursday, but even that drive is on hold.
‘That’s ok,’ I texted back to him. ‘If you can’t make it to chicken soup (my solution for any illness), the chicken soup will come to you.’ His response was a picture of Ojiisan sitting, our baby on his knee. The man looks extremely tired, but happy.
‘Anytime is good.’ he messaged. ‘And BTW, they are holding Miko all the time now – it just took them some time to get used to our ways. One can’t stay with our family for long without learning how to cuddle.’
‘Of course!’ I replied, and I sent him a dozen SMILES
Sending dozens out to you folks too – some chicken soup with that?
Luv from the Bush in Quebec.
