Sure, I’m dying. But aren’t we all? As Bob Dylan says, “He not busy being born is busy dying.” Or as David Fitzsimmons of the Star says, “Mortality sucks.” And sure, I entered hospice care recently. But I hope you won’t be reading my obituary right away.
  The thing is, I have a problem with hospitals. Often, when I go to one of them, I end up with something much worse than what I had when I went there.
  Example No. 1: Last October, I went to the hospital with a broken ankle. I was supposed to only be there overnight, until I could be treated by an orthopedic surgeon. But in that space of time, I came down with pneumonia, which required a month of antibiotic infusions in a skilled nursing facility.
  Example No. 2: A year ago, I went to the hospital with a
Tom Walker
possible congestive heart failure — serious enough in its own right. But within a day or two, I had picked up a major case of pneumonia with MRSA complication, which nearly killed me. That required two months of treatment in a care center.
  Example No. 3: Five years ago, I had heart surgery — very serious. And I was doing fine and was supposed to go home after a week. But then the doctors discovered that my old friend, pneumonia, had taken up residence in my lungs. And that led to further complications and an extra month in the hospital.
  Granted, I’m not an innocent bystander in all this. My roughly 40 years of smoking have made me susceptible to disease. But after six bouts of pneumonia, my lungs are pretty much ruined.