On the sixth day He commanded the doctors to removeth skin from the least damaged lower limb and apply it to his left upper limb. They wrapped it in swaddling bandages that shall remain there until the third day. And they looked upon what they had done and said, “This is good. “ And this was not the end of the sixth day. For in the evening of the sixth day came an awakening, and pain, and the urge to vacate the Helipad Hotel. But with the healing fluids connected to the least damaged arm came peace in the night time hours. Thus the healing begins.

That was yesterday. Yesterday whilst he was in surgery I made a flying trip back to Paducah to see my doctor and get a steroid shot for a sinus infection I’ve been battling for a couple weeks. I did laundry, played with Spanky, slept, got up, had a meal, and hightailed it back to Nashville. Somewhere along the way back I found a heads up penny and just knew I was going to have a great day.

After checking in with my family in the burn unit my wife and I slipped away for a couple of hours. We picked up a few supplies and drove over to the Parthenon. Those steps are not for short legged people. Tina needed a little assistance. Those Greeks must have been big people. Athena was standing in a large room. She’s 41 feet tall.

We saw an art exhibit while we were there too. There was a beautiful picture of a shipwreck painted in the 1850s by Eric Church titled, The Wreck. I thought to myself, “If Patrick had been on that ship when it wrecked he wouldn’t have ended up with road rash. “ Then it hit me. No one ever paints pictures of Harley wrecks. I suppose if someone wiped out near a nice seascape they might be more interested.

We returned to the hospital and I let Tina out at entrance before driving into the bowels of the parking garage. It’s a labyrinth of twists and turns that leads one into the depths of nowhere. Kinda like that Hotel California song. You can check out, but you can never leave. I found a parking spot, finally.

As soon as I returned to the room it was decided that it would be a good time to switch luggage from my car to my wife’s. So back to the garage I went. My wife knew exactly where she had parked her car early this morning, so we went to her vehicle first to get some of my things. Then she asked where I had parked my car. Hmmmm. I went blank. We began walking and looking. It’s a big garage. We must have walked for twenty minutes, looking and searching. After making a loop in and out around the whole garage I spotted it. Success! I popped the hatch and retrieved my luggage for my night at room 11216. Then I looked over and one car away sat my wife’s car. Hmmmm. I wondered if and how I was going to point this discovery out to her. I wasn’t sure if she was going to be ticked or tickled. Luckily neither. After she quit laughing she had pity on me.

Thus goes another day at the Hotel Helipad. I threw the lucky penny I found away. Maybe it’ll bring someone else better luck.

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Rick Algood
September 26, 2019