At 4:30 I awoke sweating and terribly
dehydrated. I walked out of my cabin and in the absolute darkness
attempted to walk the wet rail-less elevated walkways, failing
miserably. Twice I fell off and rolled down the hill. I walked
back up and crawled on the walkway with my right hand clasped over
the edge to the house. Arriving at the house I fumbled with the
monkey proof latch and made my way into the kitchen. It was
profoundly dark. I felt my way over to the refrigerator and felt
for the monkey proof hasp, reaching inside I couldn't find anything
but food. I couldn't find the sink. I went outside and looked for
the dogs water bowl, felt in and it was empty.
Finally the dogs entered the house and
made enough noise to wake Michelle who came down turned on the light
and gave me a couple of liters of water. Ok, I'm not trying to
make my way back to the cabin, I'll just hang out in the hammock. I
lay there, chilled from the cool air that rolls down off the mountain
across the small expanse of sea between here and the mainland.
Finally, dawn broke and people started
appearing. Time to feed my dog, who was tied up on the boat dock to
prevent him from attacking the monkey again. Down to the dock,
feeling ill. Back up 187 steps I was sweating profusely and
stumbling. Michelle saw me and cried out for someone to come help me
down the stairs into the house and placed me back in the hammock. I
was shaking and so weak I couldn't lift my arms. She plied me with
juices and spoon feed me peanut butter then wiped me down with cool
wet rags. Another volunteer took over the job. More juice, more
juice.
Michelle came out with a blood pressure
tester and her diabetic equipment. She took my blood pressure with
a very concerned look on her face and then took my blood sugar
readings and ran out of the room. Time passed, I don't know how
much. “Jim, we have to get you to a hospital can you walk?”
“Not yet.” My blood sugar was so low it wouldn't even register
on the device. More juice. About an hour later I was instructed
to go to Casa Verde to meet the floating doctors who would take me to
a hospital with no expectation that I would be returning soon. Karl
would drive the boat and come back but he couldn't find the place so
I was provided with Humberto, an employee of De La Luna and Dan, a
volunteer. Heavily laden we started off to town.
First stop, gas up. This took forever
as the gas was siphoned into five gallon buckets and then siphoned
into the boat. Dan bought me five candy bars. I ate three right
away. We proceeded slowly in some very rough seas through shitty
weather. Droning on we made it back to town a couple of hours
later. No way to dock at Casa Verde, the seas were too rough, so we
docked at the hardware store and walked to Casa Verde. I found
nothing but regulars. Where was this doctor?
Dan and Karl and I took a taxi to the
hospital. After a quick admission I was checked and my glucose
levels were at 182 not bad after having had five candy bars in an
hour. I could walk now.
Nobody could get a hold of Michelle,
she had turned her phone off.
Off to Casa Verde to look for the
doctors again, I walked the length of town. It turns out that the
whole town knew of my plight, as Michelle had considerately posted it
on Facebook. that people had been gathered for the big event, some
out of morbid curiosity and some with honey and sugar drinks. But
the doctors had gone.
I walked the streets of Bocas, barefoot
in muddy and bloody clothes in the rain.
I bought yet another cell phone, my
last one destroyed in a quick rain. Now to make some phone calls.
Back to hospital to look for Dan, put I
couldn't find the right door, back to town to find Karl to get Dan.
Karl left and Dan showed up.
Karl got an email from Michelle. Could
I pick up a generator she was buying? Dan and I went off to the
Barracuda to look for Ellene, who's husband Clay owned the generator.
Clay is the guy who built my house and this was the generator he had
used. Ellene called Clay and we went off to inspect the
generator. It was fine. So I picked it for for Michelle and Clay
and Dan carried it to the boat.
A tall skinny guy with horrible teeth
rode by on a bike. “Hey, Jim!” “Flaco, can you watch my dogs
for a while?” Well, he doesn't speak English and I, well, you
know, can't speak Spanish but the concept was conveyed. I gave him
$40 to be apportioned between dog food and services rendered. Thirty
dollars worth of dog food will last them a month. Flaco makes about
$10 a day. This is a good deal for each of us.
Back to get boat, laden with two big
adults on the bow and a heavy generator in on the foredeck. The
boat plowed through the chop, bow low. We stopped at my house to
get more clothes and other necessities and then headed back to De La
Luna in Loma Partida. We headed due south slowly through rough
water. I learned several short cuts from Humberto, the man knows
every clump of mangrove in this archipelago. It was a wet rough
ride, but I was feeling mostly human.
When we finally got to De La Luna the
girls were bathing in the ocean. Interesting, I shower when I get
out to get off the salt water. Repeated shouts from the house where
I found that the Bocas Emergency Network had been prepared to start
an all boats search for me when we finally got to Bocas. The doctor
thought based on the condition described when we left that I would
probably go into shock before we ever made it. It takes a lot to
kill a bull.
Dinner of otoy again. More juice. An
evening of various card games with four cute young women, a couple of
young guys and Karl. So much laughter for hours with nobody
drinking or getting high. This is so much better than Bocas Town.
We went to bed around nine. I got
some sleep, not enough.
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