They shaved me in places I had never shaved, taped and bandaged and medicated this body, this earthly shell. They stuck a machine in me to make the whole thing work better. Adam Smith would point out my greed for more days on this earth as the motivation to go thru an ordeal that stretched what was acceptable for my skin bag of sticks, mush and personality.
I was in the passenger seat on the ride home. The full moon was rising over the freeway. It was fat and perfectly round and silver like Eisenhower's face was about to be be embossed on it.
And that was why I did it, why I went thru the stabbing, cutting, poking, prodding and now following up for decades to come. To see that moon rise, to know other worlds while sticking around in this one. The red brake lights were glowing in the dusk of this world and the Moon just grew, assuring me that if the only thing I lived for from here on out was a few encounters with sublime beauty, all of the constipation, blood, maddening uncertainty of medical bills, paramedics certain I am on crystal meth, dances with insurance wolves and all the nausea the endless rhythm of fluid nausea, that they were all worth it because even if there is a heaven there isn't a silver moon there, there isn't one here really, but there is one nearby here, it is out there.
And there it all is.