Eye Right!

More good news on the home/family front, I took my son to Out Patients today for a check-up on his eye and it is now back to the same normal pressure as his other one. They also took out the microscopic stitch from the surgery, so he can gradually ease back in to wearing his contacts again. And they discharged him, with the recommendation that we get his optician to test his eye pressure every year as part of his usual eye check.

So no lasting damage from the accident, and he can start playing contect sports again - he's really been missing his football/soccer, so I'm glad he'll be able to play again, and we'll try not to think about the risks.

And I thought I'd mention that there was a lovely sung version of Keats' The Lake Isle of Innisfree by Anuna on Something Understood this week, hear it here (You might need to try twice for it to load)It's also available on i-tunes.

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.


The full programme, which examines the notion of "home" and the listen again option are here

I'm hoping for a little peace for a bit. An evening full of linnet's wings would be plain bloody lovely right now.

Better Day

Just back from Outpatients with my son. His eye is looking good, the clots around the rim of his iris are disappearing, which means they're being reabsorbed and the eye is draining. And the pressure in that eye is now below his good one, so they've cut the steroid drops back, as he needs to be tapered off them, but not too quickly. His pupil is still fixed and dilated, but apparantely it is like a muscle and may take up to six months to recover from the blow it suffered during the accident, and if it doesn't he can wear an adapted contact which will give him a normal sized pupil - sometimes a dilated pupil can let too much light on the back of the eye, causing headaches.

He still has a stitch in the eye, but she's leaving that for a bit yet. So he can go back to school on Monday, provided he avoids being jostled in the corridors, and we go back to the hospital again in two weeks. I'm so grateful to the skill of the consultant, as a good outcome now will reduce the risk of complications later on.

His school work is obviously suffering, but I've spoke to his registration teacher, and she's gathering up notes for hiom from all his subject teachers and I've scoured the net and managed to find and downloaded the Spark Notes on the Heart of Darkness for him on i-tunes. He'll be able to listen to them on his i-pod rather than reading through masses of notes. Changed days since I did my Higher English!

And I must be on a wee bit of a roll as I got a placing in a short story competition on this blog
Mine is here, "Off the Grid".

On the photographic contest I may even get to spend a day with the professional wlidlife photographer who judged it. Not sure yet though as the blurb wasn't specific about the prizes in each category. I won the landscape.

Off now to walk the dog and get my haircut, and after that I may feel almost human again.

Crazy few days

My son's eye problems took a turn for the worse in the early hours of Wednesday. He was readmitted to hospital and had to have emergency surgery to hoover out the debris left by the bleed, as it was more than the eye's own drainage system could cope with. He was in a lot of pain, and was very sick, due to high pressure that the blocked drainage was causing. It was very distressing for him, and for us, his parents, to watch.

Seeing him go off to theatre yesterday afternoon was the most gut-wrenching thing I've experienced. My son has always had the most beautiful blue eyes and
I kept thinking of the Plath line I posted from the poem Child, "Your clear eye is the one absolutely beautiful thing."

He's now resting in hospital, and feeling a lot better, but it's early days and I will not tempt the Gods of Irony further by saying more.

We've had a violent storm here over night which has ripped a few slates of our roof, so we have a bucket in situ up in the loft until it's safe for the slater to go up there.

Only good news is that my popular stock shot has also won a local landscape photography competition. They left a message on my machine, details of the presentation are to follow.