Nyel – April 5, 2020

Nyel is home and all is right with my world!!  Never mind that Little Red Hen is hardly moving at all.  And never mind that I managed to get almost-but-not-quite-all of the corrections that I wanted on the visuals for The Ghostly Tales of The Long Beach Peninsula.  And never mind that the Espy/Schreiber Family Reunion tentatively scheduled for the first week in July is in a bit of a state of flux.  Nyel is home and all is right with my world!!

Sue and Bill (Grennan, not Svendsen lest there be any confusion) picked me up at eight yesterday morning.  We had a lovely lunch at Elmer’s just off I-5 in Tacoma and I was in Nyel’s room five minutes before they had his final discharge papers and meds ready to go.  We boogied on home and were inside our house by five o’clock!  Bill (Bless him!) did all the driving while Sue supplied snacks and stories and good cheer both coming and going.

Sydney and Nyel, 1986 — a Stan Thompson photo for the Observer

Nyel is a shadow of his former self — 145 pounds by our scales.  For fun I looked up what the average person should weigh according to their height.  This is what I found:  For women, the ideal weight is 105 pounds for 5 feet of height, and 5 pounds for every inch after. For men, it’s 106 pounds at 5 feet and 6 pounds for every inch taller. Those are for medium-framed people. Some adjustments are made if you’re larger-framed or smaller-framed.  

For me at 5’2″, that worked out to 115 pounds — 10 pounds lighter than I am now and 15 pounds heavier than I was 40 years ago when Nyel and I met.  For Nyel at 6’2″, it worked out to 190 pounds which is just about what he was during his “prime” (and how I remember him from plummier times.)  Today, his appetite is better than it was in the weeks before he went into the hospital, so we are hopeful that he can gradually put on a few pounds.  Seconds on ice cream?  Thirds? You betcha!

Wedding Portrait – September 13, 1987

Last night he gloried in uninterrupted sleep — no  being poked by needles, changing batteries in his heart monitor, being wakened at 4:00 a.m. to be weighed etc.  Then, breakfast in bed and back to sleep for four hours more!  After a very late lunch we took a little drive in the Prius, went to Jack’s to replenish our ice cream supply and will have a late steak dinner… just because we can!

My list of thank-yous to people is without end — for cards and messages sent; for food and limitless TLC for us both; for cheering and uplifting words and prayers.  We are ever grateful to each and every one of our wonderful friends, neighbors, even strangers who have reached out during this past difficult month.  Blessings to all of you!