Sometimes too much time

I like travel time these days for thinking, singing, working on poems, and just the sheer escape it provides.  But sometimes there is too much think time available.  As I drove thi afternoon I thought about the days that led up to Anne's hospitalization.  What if I had known just a bit more about endocarditis--or anything at all?  What if I had recognized her sore chest as transferred pain from her heart rather than just another flu symptom?  What if I had just mentioned that pain in the ER--would they have done an echocardiogram then and there?  Would it have made any difference?

If I had known even a little bit then of what I know now, would Anne still be alive?

I don't know.  Doctors assured me that I did what any normal, reasonable person would do.  In my head I know that's true.  But it doesn't keep those doubts out of my guts from time to time.  What if I could have done something, anything, to save her?  But I couldn't.

I imagine this sort of survivor's guilt is just part of the deal.  It made my drive blue for thirty miles or so, and I am still thinking about it now.  I'll never know if anything would have made any difference.  And we can never act then on what we know now.  Otherwise we (I) would have done something.  But this sort of thinking is certainly another way that the pain tears away at my heart a little bit in those unguarded and unregulated moments.

It was good that I needed to stop for gas and lunch.  A change in scenery brought a change in perspective, and I was able to go on.  But it was another reminder of how much stuff there is to work through over and over and over again--even on days when I seem to be doing pretty well.