Ascent to Mount PT

OK, Boomer

It was impossible, I thought when I arrived, wheezing already from just hauling myself out of the car in the parking garage.

The Exit sign attracted my attention and that was ten steps up to ground level.

On the other hand, now I was back on my feet and sleeping normally, it was time to drop some of the body weight accumulated during twelve months’ recuperation.

While my body had healed significantly, a post-treatment lung issue lingered.

By miraculous coincidence, the owner where I had served as winemaker for three years, was also an established pulmonologist. I credit him with saving my life a year ago. Because the lung issue was not associated with detectable viruses, bacteria or fungi, it became a medical puzzle why it was not resolving faster.

My wife, a research pathologist with doctorates in both medicine and virology, thought it might be due to a bout of adult whooping cough I had had decades ago, or covid. Farm life outdoors here was fraught with the possibility of endemic Lyme disease. So, for etiology, there were plenty of choices for the discerning medic.

I had gone into the illness in good shape: not Olympic-level, but jogging every other day up and down hills at my farm. Mile and a quarter in less than 14 minutes, usually. Occasional weight lifting each summer to prepare for wine grape harvest each September, but nothing heroic.

It took a year to have strength and stamina enough to walk half that distance in twice as much time.

It was he who recommended pulmonary therapy, something I had no familiarity with. I have heard of all the fancy Peleton equipment but with fresh air enough at home and equestrian trails I had cleared over a few decades, I never considered it.

Even now, I was able to continue logging and clearing downed trees for up to five hours straight, but hauling three large chain saws up and down hills was more of a struggle than need be.

Now, the elder brother of a schoolmate won an Olympic Gold in the senior Olympics last year: dead lift of 250 lbs. He himself was a wrestler and pole vaulter earlier in life and had stayed in magnificent shape despite being 135 lbs.

Do the math: his accomplishments at weight-lifting were stunning

I was not out for a medal: I just wanted to breathe again.

***
Approaching the main hospital at 6:45 AM on Monday, I counted the steps from the curb to the entry: twenty.

It occurred to me: The sign at the top of the ascent read “Cardiac and Pulmonary Rehabilitation Therapy”.

Wait: each patient arriving had severe cardiac or lung complications.

Twenty steps?

Perhaps this was their way of triaging out the worst patients so that those remaining, when recovered, made their numbers look good.

The receptionist at the desk demurred to the engineers.

You demand that people with decreased lung capacity climb thirty stairs to arrive at their appointments?

“It was the engineers,” they said. “OK Boomer,” flashed into mind but I kept my peace and merely smiled…