'INTO YOUR HANDS' Continued...

Dear Friends,

Candy

We say hello to you all and to my daughter Candy.

Candy says that above is a better picture of her 21st birthday party with Marie Antoinette as the theme.

What a delightful distraction!

What do you think?

Was it Marie Antoinette whose famous words were ‘Let them eat cake!’

when she was told that the people did not have bread to eat? 

Ha ha ha! But Candy thinks she was misquoted!

What do you think?

🍋🍋

Last week I offered you an extract from Chapter 5 (Into Your Hands).

We encounter Nicole for the first time. She is certainly not having a good time in her work at St Michaels Hospital.  She is extremely distressed and wanting to resign from her job! However, before she can utter another word to Matron, she finds herself thrown into extraordinary events. A mysterious Catholic priest with an equally mysterious illness is the cause of the emergency and all the upheaval in Matron’s well-ordered hospital.

In the last scene, the doctors and nurses had started resuscitating Angelo. But something seems not quite right. It also seems that something really extraordinary is happening at another level.

This is so exciting!

So let’s continue from where we left off.

…The Franciscan froze. Noisome crows announced their presence with their vulgar and disconcerting caws. Exasperated, Matron Josephine shooed them off in the Name of God. Someone flung a stone at them. The man in the brown habit looked heavenward and made a desperate supplication to God.

There was a leak in the resuscitator bag and the endotracheal tube had a fault! The priest’s chest was not rising with each ventilation. He was not getting any oxygen and his colour was deteriorating!

“Bloody Heck! This can’t possibly be happening!” exclaimed a desperate consultant, turning pale as he took the bag from Nicole. “Someone! Get this flipping bag to work and give me another tube! He’s got a carotid pulse, but he’s not going to hold out for much longer! He needs rescue breaths! We can’t lose him!” He quickly removed the endotracheal tube and replaced it with an airway.

Mr Davis met Nicole’s determined look and he nodded.

Nicole gave the young priest the kiss of life.

Maintaining his airway, she pinched his nose, and taking a deep breath, she sealed his lips with hers and blew into his mouth at regular intervals.

With her lips tightly sealed to his, and with every life-saving breath, Nicole became more and more oblivious to the world around her.

The priest in the brown habit took in the scene. He raised his eyes briefly towards heaven and was just in time to see three dazzling white doves make a slow and circular flight pattern above him before disappearing into the radiant sky. He trembled violently and prayed with equal violence.

Something deep and inexplicable transpired.

Three crows reappeared from the north and circled silently and ominously above, casting their shadows over the team beneath them.

Suddenly, from the east, a dove whose snow white feathers dazzled in the blazing sunlight swooped into the circle. With the swiftness of an eagle and the precision of a warrior’s arrow, it engaged and disrupted the enemy, causing a wild fracas in the air.

The open heaven became a dramatic meeting place, a compelling centre stage, and a vicious battlefield, where the merciless shackles of death and darkness contended with pre-eminence of a love so tenacious and so formidable.

A passionate duel for the life of the ailing priest seemed to unfold.

All the while, the medical team watched the patient’s chest rise and fall with every breath. Although there was a notable improvement in his colour, the atmosphere remained tense and sweat ran down their faces as they exchanged anxious glances.

After making the Sign of the Cross, the Franciscan turned his attention back to Nicole’s passionate life-saving actions. Her sandy brown curls had tumbled over her face and her hair was wild.

The Franciscan watched with great wonder.

The manual resuscitator bag was successfully repaired and a new tube was inserted and secured.  As Nicole squeezed the bag at regular intervals, she saw the patient’s chest rise and fall. All the while she prayed fiercely to God.

Please, Lord!

Nicole quickly glanced heavenward. The Franciscan priest, who stood very close by, saw this brief tearful look towards heaven and struggled to wipe away his own tears. The tears ran like rivulets and disappeared into his short, curly beard, before flowing over Nicole’s down-turned head. He held even more tightly on to the bag he was carrying, his knuckles white and his hands trembling uncontrollably. His English was relatively limited and he did not seem to understand all that was being said by the doctors.

“Can’t get a blood pressure…”

“That’s it! Get the drip going…”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake! The bloody vein…it’s not going to last!”

“We need to rush inside now!”

***

Everything was happening so quickly. Soon he was in the ward where the other teams joined in. He was connected to a ventilator from Anaesthetic Room 3A. Because the peripheral veins were shutting down, a central line had to be put into a large vein and fluid challenges given.

“We’ve got a blood pressure!” said Dr Llewellyn, the registrar, after tense, agonising moments.

“But she ain’t that pretty and she’s still down to her boots!” said Freddy, the junior doctor.

“Who are we talking about?”

“The blood pressure!”

“Why does everything negative in your mind has to be a girl?” complained Dr Sarah.

“Oh, don’t worry about Freddy! He’s got a girlie issue at the moment. His true love found new love!”

“Maybe he ain’t doing something right,” Dr Sarah stated.

“He’s too skinny. Maybe those bones get in the way. Girls want brawn… like mine!” Dr Llewellyn flexed a muscle or two.

“Tell you what; it’s that long nose of his. It gets in the way of a good kiss!”

“Ouch, guys! You do realize that I am actually present and in deep emotional pain? Winced Dr Freddy.

“We need to catheterise… I can’t palpate a bladder… Possible renal failure, “Dr Meaghan looked dismayed.

The doctors continued to work frantically for many hours.

***

“He’s going into multi-organ failure…”

“Sepsis…”

“The source…?”

“Ugh man, it could be anything… anything! Man, this guy’s a missionary. He lives in the deep jungle,” remarked Dr Llewellyn.

“Definite malaria?”

“Till the slides and blood results come back,” Mr Davis shrugged, “we’ll have to treat him for suspected cerebral malaria and septicaemia. Let’s get those antibiotics going. There is no telling…”

“Do we rule out snakebite?”

“Ha…?”

“Sleeping sickness? He could have been bitten by the tsetse fly!”

“Has anyone thought about the scorpion?” asked someone.

“Or spiders! What about the black widow?”

“Isn’t that found in the temperate zones like North America and East Asia?” asked Meaghan.

“For heaven’s sake, do we need a compendium of the terrors of the jungle?” cut in Matron caustically.

“Are the X-rays on their way, Matron? It shouldn’t take this long,” remarked Mr Davis.

“Hey, the blood pressure is looking a bit better,” Dr Llewellyn observed.

“His cardiac rhythm seems… look… I don’t like those huge ectopic heartbeats… Do a repeat electrocardiogram. I don’t like that look. Poor guy!”

“Mr Davis – what is his prognosis?” asked Dr Freddy.

“What do you think?”

“Er… maybe we shouldn’t talk over the patient. Whilst a patient maybe unconscious, we must be very aware that they are still able to hear us, according to my training, old fashioned though it may seem to be,” reminded Matron. “One can always discuss it outside – but never within the patient’s hearing – because the last vestige of hope, which may still be residing in the subconscious and in his spirit, might just be put out forever!”

Mr Davies rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes, what Matron says is true.” Mr Davies never hid his love-hate relationship and irritations between himself and the hospital matron. They always seemed to be at loggerheads regarding the whole business of running the hospital. She might be the matron, but he, as Director, felt that she continually sought to undermine his authority.

Nicole was relieved to see some signs of renal function even though the hourly amount of urine she was emptying from the catheter bag never exceeded more than two tablespoons.

Her hope was short-lived. As she looked up from carrying out these measurements, she saw the consultant’s sign language to the junior doctor: the prognosis for the missionary priest was a definite thumbs-down.

Her heart was solely troubled. …

                                         ***

I hope you are feeling the pulse of the story through the emotions in this scene. As for now, let us take a break. We will continue with Chapter 5 because I want you to taste the whole of it!

Cheers,

Olivia

YEAR OF JOURNEYING WITHIN MYSELF

Greetings Friends,

I hope you are well. I have a good message for you but before you read it below, let me introduce you to my 'birthday girl' and the cake I made for her!

Here is a cake I made for my daughter Candy's 21st 

birthday. What do you think of it?

My daughter Candy wearing a Marie Antoinette dress as that was the theme for her birthday.

***

W

 e are now over two weeks into 2020 and yet it still feels so surreal.  Does anyone else feel the same way?  I feel I still need to catch up with 2020.  I have been caught up between working and the grandchildren, hence all my intended goals for this year are still jumbled in my head!

I have set aside these few days to make time to just sort it all out and write the goals down clearly in a journal. I need a vision! I am told that where there is no vision, people perish! I am also told that I must write  down the vision/goal, read it regularly and believe in it!

To be honest with you I am good at writing all the  New Year’s resolutions yet swiftly forgetting them the rest of the year. But folks this is a different year! (Trust me!) Honest.

Have you ever felt that you need some things in your life to change? I truly believe that the desire to change begins in one’s heart. There is a certain stirring - a persistent niggle that something has certainly got to change. 

Have you ever felt like you have been stuck on one level and you start to look at yourself. You re-evaluate yourself and realize that life has so much more to offer.

The post-Christmas and New Year’s exhaustion has resulted in me running on survival mode.

But now, I have to attend to that SOS in my soul. I have to make a JOURNEY within myself and address the changes I need to make. This can only be done in SILENCE.

I have to start with small steps at a time.

So tomorrow when I drop my grandson at his nursery, I shall head for the Meadows which are only five minutes away. When I walk through the gates of the Meadows my back will be turned to the traffic and I enter into this world, a Paradise of SILENCE.  I will feel a tangible shift within myself as I walk deeper alongside nature. I can see myself inhaling the fragrance of the rain-soaked earth as I regain my equilibrium.

I so long for this time to go within myself and establish where I am going.

Like Angelo, the protagonist in The Next of Kin, I too believe in visions and dreams.

We have to believe that all things are possible with God.

It is sometimes so hard to lift my eyes from the earthly reality I see every day and focus on the realms of supernatural intervention which make the impossible possible.

Jesus tells us to ‘only believe!’  That means we have to believe not only when things are going well but especially and continuously and faithfully when we are facing deep harrowing situations. Faith calls for courage. The Bible says that we must make the vision clear! Write it down! It surely come to pass.

Habakkuk 2:2-3

“Write the vision;

make it plain on tablets,

so he may run who reads it.

For still the vision awaits its appointed time;

it hastens to the end—it will not lie.

If it seems slow, wait for it;

it will surely come; it will not delay.

So Friends let us gather round and write down our visions and dreams and place them in the hands of God and believe. ONLY BELIEVE!

Until we meet next week, cheers!


Olivia

INTO YOUR HANDS

Dear Friends

Happy New Year to you and your families! We have crossed over into 2020 riding on the wings of His Amazing Grace. I wish you every success and happiness in everything your hands work on. Stay blessed!

I have thought of starting the year with a return to the beginning of Part Two of my novel The Next of Kin. Let us go to the opening Chapter Five titled “Into Your Hands”, and is prefixed with a verse from the Book of Jonah in the Bible. In my novel, this chapter happens in January 1990. That's 30 years ago! We are in January, imagine it is happening now, refreshed. I want you to flow with this imaginative, climactic and eventful passage as a sick Father Angelo is flown from Mozambique to Zimbabwe where more revelations are already waiting....

Zimbabwe – 5 January 1990

“S

The Feast of the Epiphany of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

 taff Nurse Nicole! There you are!” Matron wiped her sweaty brow.

“I am so glad you have come back! I had a search party looking for you!”

“Did you really, Reverend Matron Josephine?” Staff Nurse Nicole asked very softly. Her emerald green eyes, brimming with tears, challenged the matron of St Michael’s Hospital. “I wish to resign with immediate effect!”

Before Matron could react, her emergency radio went off. She quickly reached into her pocket, pressed a button and spoke, “Operator?”

The operator’s voice came in loud and clear across the radio. “This is an emergency, a Code Blue. I repeat – a Code Blue. Message received from Control: There is a Catholic missionary from Mozambique arriving here via helicopter in two hours’ time. Italian missionary priest. Condition is critical… respiratory failure… unconscious… Diagnosis is uncertain… possible cerebral malaria.”

“Wait a minute! Who authorised this?” Matron demanded.

“Mr Davies, who is both the hospital consultant and superintendent of course!”

“That’s insane! Our hospital is a small private hospital, not a general and emergency. It does not have the critical care facilities!” Matron began walking furiously up and down the corridor.

“No! This case must be redirected to Avondale – to the Parirenyatwa General Hospital, or even to St Anne’s Hospital in Avondale! I override Mr Davies!”

“I am afraid that’s not possible, Matron. Avondale cannot cope. There has been a bus disaster and they are struggling to cope with the casualties. Mr Davies is already on his way down. One moment…”said the voice. “I have Mr Davies on the line…One moment, I will put Mr. Davies on…”

A deep masculine voice with a strong Australian accent drawled authoritatively, “Matron, all staff to go on stand-by for Plan Blue immediately! Patient on his way!”

“This is ludicrous! Where will the helicopter land? The hospital does not possess a heliport or even a helipad or even suitable roof access! Furthermore, in my entire time of being here at St Michael’s – all these thirty-three years -  we’ve never had a helicopter land here! Then, what next? Ours will be the only hospital in the entire world that has its own special runway!”

“I have already given instruction to security – I will explain the details later, Matron,” an exasperated nasal voice droned over the radio.

“They will soon commence clearing St Raphael’s Gate and create a makeshift heliport. And as there is no roof access, that site is perfect, being conveniently close enough to the loading lifts. Security has in fact made this suggestion themselves. All will soon be in place, believe it or not, Matron! Besides, St Michael’s occupies vast acres devoted to fruit trees and gardens and, yes, even ample space for a runway. This may just be the beginning of things to come! Oh, yes!”

“Mr Davies, may I insist?”

“No! You may not insist, Matron Josephine! I thought that St Michael’s was a Catholic-run hospital. A very critically ill Roman Catholic priest, totally incapacitated, is at our mercy, Matron! I don’t need to remind you that you are first and foremost a religious nun and then you are a matron and I am Superintendent of this hospital!”

“Superintendent, no doubt – but he also the death of me! He wants to turn my well-ordered hospital upside down and cause downright chaos!” fumed an agitated matron, switching off her radio with an impassioned click.

Nicole’s eyes grew wider as she listened to the conversation and watched the matron’s face flush hotly.

‘Well, then, Staff Nurse – don’t just stand there! There goes the emergency siren! We have to move it. I hope Mr. Davies will live to regret this day! He might find himself standing before the Papal court answering to the mismanagement of its Italian missionary priest. I would have something to say to the Pope! Indeed, I would!”

It seemed all hell had broken loose – legs appeared from every direction and responded to the matron’s commands. The emergency equipment was quickly transported to the heliport. A team composed of the hospital consultant – Mr Davies, two medical registrars, one senior medical officer and one junior doctor and a team of nurses, which included Matron Josephine and Staff Nurse Nicole, awaited the helicopter, while another team prepared the bed and equipment in a side room of St Anthony’s Wing.

At the makeshift heliport, the equipment went through a series of tests. Some of it had never been used and was still in its packaging and in need of quick assemblage. There were sighs of relief and jubilant high-fives all around when the devices seemed to function well.

***

The sound of a helicopter was soon audible; then the helicopter was visible. Everyone’s attention was focused on the silver helicopter before it landed on the heliport.

The door of the helicopter was flung open and three people emerged from it: two were medics who frantically wheeled the patient out on a stretcher – the third man was a Franciscan priest dressed in a long brown habit.

Mr Davies quickly assessed the patient’s condition. He looked lifeless, barely breathing and his pulse was weak and thready. Immediately, the consultant ordered the registrars to intubate and ventilate the patient whilst others set up an intravenous infusion and administered emergency medication. The two medics from Mozambique gave a quick hand over as the team sprang into action.

Nicole rushed over to secure the patient’s head during the intubation procedure. Tear welled up in her eyes. He looked more dead than alive.

This poor, poor priest!

Oh God! Let him live to do your will! She prayed, unaware that, as she spoke passionately from her heart, she instinctively made the Sign of the Cross over his forehead.

As she looked up, she met the gaze of the man in the Franciscan habit with a cincture tied across his waist. It was clear that he was a dear friend who was accompanying the patient from the mission, for he had tears in his eyes.

Nicole noticed that  he was carrying a small bag. He looked pleadingly at her and she reciprocated by looking briefly at him with deep compassion before reverting her full attention to this new arrival whose life hung between life and death.

The Franciscan priest squinted to see her name badge.

Staff Nurse Nicole Anderson.

“Suction,” said the registrar.

The tube was quickly put into position and secured.

“Nurse – connect bag. Start ventilations!”

Nicole immediately initiated the life-saving breaths by squeezing the manual resuscitator bag that was connected to a small oxygen cylinder. However, an unexpected problem was encountered with the emergency equipment and a desperate commotion ensued.

Meanwhile, there was a second commotion…

 

*

What happens as the hospital is seized by panic? Grab a copy and finish the story. Feel free to comment on this extract. Thank you so much and until we meet again in the next post, Cheers!

- Olivia