Call it our plant or factory or complex organism where life is received, nurtured, healed, fed, rested, and alerts go out saying that we’re getting old and weary…
YESTERDAY after work, I’m sitting on our front porch, texting somebody or something and a black, noodley object is flashing across my keyboard, left to right and then left again. What the hell? It’s not a fly or a bug, it’s inside me! I look up, side to side, and here it comes, and there it goes as I try to follow it.
I close my right eye, it persists, close my left eye, it goes away. So it’s something in my left eye! Too much computer work? Too much social media, column, Blog, “Taproot & Aniseweed,” or just weary at 74 and slowly wearing out, falling to pieces? I see the old, normal floaters that have been around in my eyes for eons, they look like small, transparent cellular growths, but this NEW one is dark, noodley, graphic, and nothing like those. I look hard right to bring it to center, it gets lighter, then I try to look at it straight on, and it disappears to the left, getting dark again. Damn! Wife Jan comes home, we discuss it, she says, “Call Kaiser, have it looked at.”_I shut down the cellphone and don’t open the laptop for the night. We have dinner, watch some TV, I see the new dark floater dance about but not like a contestant on “Dancing With The Stars.” The news comes on, more horror and buffoonery in Washington, D.C., so we shut it off, start killing the lights in the family room to go to bed, and I see my first flashing lights! What the hell? One or two small points of light careen across the inside of my head! “Oh, Christ, I must be falling apart!” I tell Jan, she says, “You gotta call Kaiser, this sounds serious!” We go to bed and the meteor shower subsides.
4 a.m., my somewhat normal wakeup time, I go downstairs, too dark to see the new “dark floater” but a few twirls of light fly by like points of comet light. I keyboard “Floaters in the eye” into my Yahoo Search window and read all about it: “Gelatinous material inside the eye, with age, 50 to 75, sometimes forms fibrous material which ‘floats’ about. Sometimes accompanied by flashing lights, if the latter occurs, this is serious, see your opthalmology doctor.” Further information about “torn retinas, etc.” follows. I shut down the laptop, rest both eyes, plan to call Kaiser at 8 a.m. Then call to postpone my 10 a.m. work appointment.
The Kaiser advice nurse on the phone asks me a dozen triage questions to determine the severity of my case. No need to dispatch a Swat Team or ambulance or Paramedics, call this number directly, “tell them you were referred by the Call Center Advice Nurse.” I do, I get “Tony,” who says only “Vicky” can book me in, he transfers me, I connect with Vicky. My appointment is for 3:45 this Tuesday afternoon. I call my customer the second time this morning, we connect and we’re still on for 10 a.m.
2 pm.., after work and lunch, I’m in the Kaiser-Vallejo parking structure, not wasting any time, this column is due Wednesday morning so I’m writing this first draft on my cellphone. 3:20 I check in early, 4:00 p.m. I’m in the waiting area with 3 to 4 ahead of me.
Nurse “Maria” invites me in, seats me in the Great Opthalmology Measuring Chair and starts measuring stuff. No “puff of air” in the eyes, this looks very high-tech, like we’re onboard the Starship-3009. I give her my story of the last 24 hours, she measures more, dilates my eyes and sends me out to the Waiting Area for dilation to set in.
Back in, I meet Dr. “Usha” and she looks deep with more high-tech apparatus into these dilated eyes of mine, then states, “No detached retina, no retinal damage, Yes, changing biochemistry with age” and she gives me printed education sheets on floaters and macular degeneration; we look at a great eye model and she points out the various parts of eye anatomy. She prescribes “Eye Vitamins” from Pharmacy 2, and “Leafy green vegetables are good for the eyes too.” We discuss near-future cataract surgery but that’s a different issue. 4-6 hours from now the dilation drops will dissipate, I finish this column-Draft back in the parking structure on my cellphone while wearing dark glasses._Wow, what a day!
Engineering, poetry, songwriting and graphic design were all great career and life segments, but in the next lifetime, I’m skipping Kindergarten and going straight to Med School! So much to learn about how we tick in our physical plants.

Peter Bray writes, works, and has lived in Benicia since 1983. He’s written this column since 2008.

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