Vampires and Slaves

in ‘M5’ but I don’t seem to be there anymore. “

“Very good. You seem to be mentally recovering well”

“So I am not going to die?”

The medium rare hamburger — was great!

Any bacteria present wandered into the dark, cold, and perilous biome that is my body. A nightmare alley for both friend and foe.

Over the next two hours I chatted with several people, sometimes in a group. We discussed the water level of the dam. Future weather. Forest fires. Covid vaccinations. Social dissent.

Obviously these are getting to meaty topics, and coming from one of the wealthiest and highest-vaccination-rate counties of the US, this could go sideways very quickly. But I admit I haven’t been vaccinated… I don’t believe masks help me or prevent me from infecting others… and I have had disagreements with the US government. All of these are true statements, but are likely interpreted differently than the details and my real beliefs would support. I also intentionally don’t mention exactly where I live. That plus my bright yellow worker’s jacket seems to help me break through a few layers of the onion that is growing here and inch a little closer to the heart of the rebellion.

With that seed planted, I head back home to the black hole that keeps me alive.

The machines and tubes — make more sense to me now. I have a feeding and drug-injection tube. This appears to go all the

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way down to my stomach or intestines. Nurses play with that a few times a day to give me drugs, and the feeding tube is pumping almost continuously. I also have a trialysis catheter inserted into my neck, which enables something called dialysis along with other things. Apparently dialysis is replacing my kidneys… which have decided not to work anymore. I also have tubes for things to ‘leave’, but very little seems to be moving through them. I want to go to the bathroom, but apparently that is not an option. Would ‘unwiring’ me be too difficult?

Nurses (all RNs) come day and night to fiddle with me and the machines. I rarely sleep, and just keep watching the spinning clock. Shifts change and new nurses come in. Each new shift fiddles with me and the machines, as if this whole system is a very interesting thing to study and play with. I am apparently a great case study for something.

Sometimes the nurses attach vials to my neck catheter, which feels a lot like they are sucking my blood. I can’t see how they do it: just the resulting test tube filled with strangely colored blood. It seems darker then I remember blood being. Maybe it is just dark in the room?

It is about 5 o’clock — when I return to Palo Alto. During the ride back, I did two addiction-recovery meetings by Zoom. I currently need to do four or five of these a week to stay on the ‘Liver Transplant’ list. As part of getting onto this queue for a replacement liver (mine decided to stop functioning along with those negligent kidneys), I signed a contract with Stanford that required a large number of things.

First… I am not allowed on roofs. Well… that isn’t actually first, but it is true. First, I agreed to do anything and everything a doctor tells me. Don’t drink (“check… actually wasn’t drinking long before visiting Stanford ER”); don’t climb on roofs (“check”); don’t drink

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too many or too few liquids (“check”); don’t eat sushi, rare-ish meat, soft-boiled eggs, and grapefruits (“apparently ‘not check’ but we will get back to that”).

Next, I agreed to do addiction-recovery meetings almost every day: it started out as more than one a day and then tapered down. I also have to talk with a psychiatrist as often as they want. I must tell someone if I “feel strange”. And the contractual list goes on and on.

I signed it in exchange for ‘my life’, and so I view it as an unbreakable vow. Or at least breakable in only one way.

The addiction-recovery meetings are both the least necessary and the most enjoyable item of this contract. They are especially pleasant when I am driving: they help fill in the otherwise idle time. A twohour commute passes more quickly for me within a meeting or two than even with a book on tape.

Doctors visit me sporadically — but it is hard to predict when they will visit and how many of them will be in the pack. Sometimes it is just a single grey-haired man. Sometimes it is almost a dozen people of various ages, many of which may be residents. They rarely introduce themselves and commonly don’t talk to me at all. Or maybe they do, and I just keep forgetting their names?

The doctors study me and my medical records. They don’t use their stethoscopes, which seems out of character for a doctor. Maybe some covid quarantine rule? The machines do not interest them either: I guess they are just supposed to do their duties. It is a big duty keeping me alive.

The only doctor that does actively interact with me and I am sure is ‘mine’ is Dr. A. She is a psychiatrist. My psychiatrist. She always notably arrives in beautiful outfits vs. boring, identical, medical coats.

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It is easy to recognize and remember her. Why I need a psychiatrist, I don’t know. But at least for the moment, she is mine.

Apparently most patients will have to find a different doctor when they leave the hospital, but I am pretty sure I want to keep her if I must have a psychiatrist at all. For one, she is nice enough to read my book. Given it was a memoir, that saved me a lot of time explaining certain things about my past. Ultimately that past did not matter, but a veneer of a person in physical recovery needed to be developed.

We spend a number of hours talking about liver and kidney failure, addictive personalities, suicide, side effects of post-transplant drugs, restrictions post-transplant, and the physical & mental impacts of having liver and kidney transplant surgery. The core questions that matter to her and the Committee of Gods are: (a) will I obey the pre-surgery & post-surgery behavioral rules; and (b) will I make sure others know if anything is amiss with me mentally or physically. If I do those things, I will get on the transplant list.

A month or so later, I am on the transplant list. And find out that list is irrelevant to me.

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THE RECRUIT — DR. A.

“I believe he would be a good candidate for the advanced program.”

“I thought he had psychotic breaks?” Dr. B., the chair of the committee, started with. Always very to the point.

“No… no psychotic breaks that we know of. He has had at least one severe manic episode, caused by extreme stress. ”

“But he is a good candidate in spite of that?”

“His mania under stress appears to manifest as becoming extremely energized & focused on solving the problems that caused the stress: he considers all possible actions — even extra-legal or self-transformational — that will help provide a positive resolution in his calculation. In essence, he has an on-demand bipolar condition. He crashed a bit after the problems were solved, but was not debilitated by the crash. ”

“And this does not cause permanent damage to him?”

“Not damage per se, but it can transform him. Previous to the known manic episode, he was quite solitary beyond work and family, and would appear to be a very quiet introvert to most people. During the episode, one of his solutions was to become hyper-social, interacting with almost anyone who could provide an alternative perspective. After the problems were resolved he stopped being hyper-social, but continued to be very social without needing to be. He is social purely by choice, and is equally comfortable being completely isolated. So he effectively improved himself for our purposes”

“How is that an improvement, in your opinion?”

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“The members of the advanced program need to be very independent, and tend to be isolated for long stretches. But they must also influence others, which requires social skills. He appears to be far more socially skilled than an introvert would normally be. He may have been quite charming actually.”

“He is no longer charming?”

“No, now he is very charming, but it is unclear whether the transformation is the major cause of that. Something about the transformation tends to produce that skill: innate charisma you might call it.”

“We are hoping it produces a number of skills, please be on the lookout for them. Your recommendation was already approved unanimously by the whole committee: this was all just a formality.”

“Thank you”

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