No More Tears

They’ve told me nothing, and when I ask, plaintive, the day before when a woman finally calls to tell me to be there at 7:15, she kindly explains that she is only the scheduler.

“How long is your eye surgery?” my oldest daughter asks.

“No clue,” I answer.

“Mom!”  Her exasperation crackles through the line

“Not for want of trying,” I offer, again, slightly ashamed of myself for heading into a procedure—albeit a minor one that might not even work—with so little information.

I have wept from my left eye spontaneously for decades.  Adult when it began, I attributed it to my ferocious seasonal allergies and began slipping one of my mother’s soft linen hankies into the stretchy gold wristband of my Mickey Mouse watch; the fabric was softer than any tissue.  I’d blot my eye, make light of my proclivity for drama, explain to the girls in my school what a handkerchief was.  Vaguely, I recall asking my allergist about my left eye; he said it was an eye problem; an eye doctor, seen along the way as my vision worsened, assured me it was an allergy.  Last December, I developed an infection in my right eye.  I was traveling; no drops soothed it.   Finally, back in Ohio, I saw a new eye doctor.  As she offered relief, I mentioned my crying left eye.

“We can fix that, you know. It’s your tear duct.  You need to see Dr. Perry—not the wife, the husband.”

Nasolacrimal canal may have been the term he muttered.  Surgery.  Successful in 80% of cases.  Or 60%.  I scheduled surgery.  I didn’t ask a lot of questions.  And then the pandemic.

At the Clinic, the receptionist is excited that I am early because the person before me has just canceled.  Swiftly, a mask-to-mask kiss with my husband, and I am bundled into a hospital gown and onto a bed.  My feet are cold.  I forgot socks. No one pays much attention to me except to ask about anesthesia and former surgeries.

I smile blankly.  “I don’t love it,” I say.  “Sometimes, I throw up.”

“You won’t,” one of the kind nurses assures me.  “It’s a general because it’s your eye.  You don’t want to be awake.”

No, I think, wondering if it is tacky to go to sleep before anyone gives me drugs. Later, I make a list:  breast reduction, c-section, foot, shoulder, appendectomy. 

Dr. Perry, unrecognizable in surgery garb, appears.  “So, off we go.”

My bed rolls into the bright OR, a plastic mask, covering my nose.  I come awake to Lorna Doones and apple juice. Kindergarten snacks. 

“You might get a black eye,” the recovery nurses suggests.  “Don’t worry that your mouth is dry.  Only Tylenol.  And ice.  Off you go.”

I am home and hungry by 10:00 a.m.  The eye itches, even a few days later.  Time will tell if the tiny tube inserted to carry my tears away is doing its job.  Will I miss those tears?