Hugs yesterday, a good-bye kiss today – what an effort! Besos y abrazos.

A nurse who had not seen Pádraig for a couple of weeks was back today and said she couldn’t believe how well he looked, sitting in his ‘new’ wheelchair, without extra oxygen. He also moved his feet, a number of times, for the senior doctor; and the music therapist. Now that he can move his left foot and his right foot when asked, we were thinking whether we should try left foot for ‘yes’, right foot for ‘no’ – but this might still be a bit much to expect. He hasn’t used the speech valve for a number of days, not exactly sure why, but I guess they’re taking it easy after the stomach upset last Saturday – it would be dangerous to get food from an upset stomach into the lungs for risk of infections.

It’s eleven months since the accident today. At this time eleven months ago, I was frantically booking tickets, hiring a car on the other side of the world, packing my bags, in a haze, checking out of a hotel on a South China Sea island at 5am, with everyone else being fast asleep, except a young receptionist who told me about her small religious community who, she said, would pray for my son, my family, and myself, she said that it all would turn out well, it was the beginning of an out-of-body experience, of no sleep, of no food, of life in a daze, a trip around the world in 30 hours, the flushing of whatever was left in my body when I saw Pádraig in the ICU for the first time, everybody being so kind I knew Pádraig was not well, not well, not well at all, then waiting and hoping, then praying and pleading for him to wake up in the next hour, the next day, the next, and the next. Waiting. Panicking. Despairing. Hours, days, nights, all merged into one. Walks to Hyannis Harbour just before the break of dawn with Pat, when the nurses turned Pádraig around, not being able to talk to each other about what was going on, not being able to grasp reality. Seagulls. What will we do. We can’t stay here. – Can’t believe that it will just be another months and we’ll be starting to count the time after year one.