max s. gerber(the latest shot)

jeni was nice enough to call me up and let me know she was having her pacemaker replaced, and was even nicer to let me tag along once again, camera in hand, just like the old days. except this time in addition to her parents and brother, i joined jeni’s husband, nick and a couple of her friends in the waiting room at the brand new hospital at UCLA.

it’s been six years or so since i last followed someone else through a surgery, and it’s funny to see how some things change and how some things don’t. everything seems so much smoother now, so much less anxious than it did even a handful of years ago. maybe we’re all just getting older, jeni and me, and maybe we all have feathers that are a bit harder to ruffle.

i feel a bit bad for nick who had never seen jeni through a surgery himself, but he handled things well, kept his cool, and it was easy for me to see why jeni was always so crazy for him. it’s not an easy thing to watch someone you love go through surgery - any kind of surgery - especially when the person you love is already defying the odds.

when i was at the ACHA conference in may i met a doctor from philadelphia children’s hospital named gil wernovsky. gil was giving a presentation there and afterward he remarked to me that someone in the audience had raised their hand, stood up and asked a question beginning with the phrase “my wife has hypoplastic left heart syndrome. . .” and that just floored him. for those that don’t know, this is really the first time in history that anyone with HLHS would live to be old enough for marriage. of course, the guy asking the question was nick, and his wife was jeni.

perhaps because we’ve all gotten a little older and settled in to things a bit, and because the technology has rapidly improved, this surgery was done as an outpatient procedure, much different from the last time. in an odd coincidence, the doctor who just replaced jeni’s pacemaker was the same one who put my first one in, more than twenty five years ago. thanks again, dr. laks.

(above: jeni’s friends waiting outside the recovery room for a chance to see her; below: jeni getting in the car to go home from the hospital)