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The Surgery Insomniacs

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Chapter One

Time had passed. And situations were different. I was staring at a glass of red wine and made a decision to write this all down. You see, I feel some stories should be told.

Over ten years ago, I worked long hours as a registered nurse in surgery. Though my name is Wolf, my co-workers sometimes called me Wolfy.

It was at some point back then, that I belonged to an informal club. We were the "surgery insomniacs." The club belonged to no one person. The club's membership often changed.

Rank was determined by the dark circles under one's eyes.

We didn't inquire as to the personal reasons for each others' sleepless nights. We didn't have to; we understood people, and we understood each other.

As I write this, most of the club's members, including myself, are leading different lives, far from the previous lives we once led. But I know all of us sometimes awaken in the middle of the night and wonder what the other members of the group are doing now. You can't help but sometimes wonder.

The Tattooed Lady

Back then, on days that I wasn't scheduled to work in surgery, I sometimes moonlighted at a hospital for ventilator-dependant patients-patients that are indebted to a breathing machine for their last inhalations and exhalations on earth.

It was there that I took care of a patient named Vivian. She was a 91-year-old woman in a coma on a ventilator, who was alone and dying. She had no family, no friends, and no visitors. She was forgotten. Though sad, this was not an uncommon ending for many patients at this type of hospital.

But Vivian was very different in another way. Her body was a masterpiece of tattoo art that flowed endlessly and cohesively from head to toe and front to back. Only her face remained untouched. But interlaced colors and textures swirled about her, depicting stories, chapters, places, moments, and characters. I got the feeling these were all people, places and moments from her past and that these tattoos represented her life's story ... her autobiography.

Though the ink's color was now faded much like an older person's memory of things past, I imagine it was once as brilliant as her life was during her youth.

The first time I took care of her, I remember being so taken aback at the sight of her tattoos. I sat at her bedside as the ventilator pumped and hissed. Though she was in a coma and at a point of no return, I spoke to her as if she could hear me and understand me. I said, "Vivian, I wish I had met you earlier in life. I would have really liked to have known you. I'll bet there is a story behind each and every one of your tattoos. Were you the tattooed lady in a circus? Or were you in a motorcycle gang? Who were you? Where have you been? Whom did you love? Who were your friends? What happened? Where did it all go? I would have written it all down for you and told your story."

I remember thinking, if only she could sit up and speak like in some Edgar Allen Poe story. But this was real life, no Poe drama.

Over the next few weeks, she just lay there motionless in a coma, slowly leaving this life, never to emerge to tell her story.

The day she died, I didn't even get the chance to say goodbye. One Saturday, I was looking for a cup of coffee when the morning nurse informed me of her passing. I thought to myself, "I would just like to pay my last respects to Vivian."

I was just down the hall from her room when the sound of my beeper commanded my immediate attention. I glanced at the number on the pager. It was the surgery department at Circle Hospital where I worked full-time. I walked over to the nurses' station and used their phone to call the number. Back then, cell phones were still evolving, and I had left mine in the car. In truth, I was still getting used to the idea of using and carrying one.

The surgery department secretary answered the phone. I knew the voice: it was Carmine. Carmine was an attractive Italian woman with a heart of gold and a mouth like a truck driver.

I said, "Carmine, "it's me, Wolf. Did you page me?" She replied, "You got an emergency crani (craniotomy) on some little kid coming up from the E.R.!" I responded, "I'll be there in five minutes."

I hung up the phone and told my co-workers that I had an emergency. "I have to go!" I was running down the stairs before I finished the sentence. In less than 60 seconds, I was on North Avenue en route to Circle Hospital. When I left, the nurses said a prayer for the one we all came to know as the tattooed lady.

When her essence of life no longer flowed, they carefully wrapped her body and had it removed to the Cook County morgue. Her life's story, which was written in tattoos, was now a book closed forever. I thought about Vivian sometimes over the years. That was life. The things that were, and the things that remain ... sort of.

In less than four minutes after I hung up with Carmine, I parked my car at the Circle Hospital E.R. entrance and ran in. As I hurried through the E.R., I spoke with the craniotomy patient and her parents, and then retrieved the remaining information from the house supervisor.

The little kid- a 12-year-old named Heidi with long black hair and green eyes- needed a craniotomy because of a baseball accident. A baseball bat had slipped from the batter's hands and hit her on the side of the head. She was still wearing her baseball uniform, and though she was tomboyish, she wore a necklace with a pink unicorn on it.

I passed her teammates in the hospital waiting area, and then ran upstairs and into the locker room. (In my mind, I was thinking about what was needed for the case.) And I was thinking that I still didn't get that cup of coffee. It was Saturday morning and I was pretty confident that Carmine had some waiting. I was also confident that the emergency craniotomy case cart with all the necessary supplies was waiting in the sterile room. After all, I had seen it the previous night when I was working with the rest of the surgery insomniacs on two trauma cases.

I changed into my scrubs and was about to open the door, which led to the O.R. lounge, which led to the control desk and surgical suites. And then I heard, "STOP!" I turned around and it was one of our security guards. His name was Burton, but it should have been Barney Fife. He said, "Do you work here?"

Now every security guard knows everyone on the surgical team. Every security guard except for Burton. My first thought was to be sarcastic and say, "No, I don't! I just happen to have the key to surgery, the combination to this locker with the name Wolf on it and...." But I didn't say any of that; I needed to hurry, so I just pulled out my I.D. and showed it to him and thanked him for checking. In truth, he was just trying to do his job.

He looked it over and said, "Ok!" I then headed through the door, and I could smell the coffee. But there just wasn't time to drink some.

I strode past the coffee pot in the lounge and hurried through the doorway to the control desk. Carmine's eyes met mine and she said, "Romeo's on his way, and Angelo is opening up the case in O.R. 1. Dr. Trams is in E.R. with Degas and they are bringing that kid up in five minutes!"

Dr. Tim Trams was the anesthesiologist on first call and Dr. Andrea Degas was the neurosurgeon on call.

I put on a mask and entered O.R. 1. Angelo said,...