On Thursday, November 19th the beloved teen bride of just 47 years made the rounds for her pre-op exams prior to Monday's surgery - vitals, Covid and a bunch of other stuff. She went solo to three different medical offices. It's a go.

Yeah, I understand that I had my left side and back cut open to remove part of a cancerous lung and some lymph nodes in June but that lung job was done without busting up my ribs with saws and axes.

Bypass heart surgery involves getting through the breastbone and parting some ribs to get into the heart. The top guy at NYU/Langone at Winthrop Hospital is performing the surgery and called me after an angioplasty exam and one-day hospitalization to say that Colleen has a heart artery 99% clogged and another one at 90%. She gets this surgery or she's going to have another heart attack. She's already had one but never knew it. She has damaged heart muscle that has healed and strengthened according to her heart surgeon.

With successful surgery my girl could live to be 80, 90 or a hundred and, when my time runs out, bury my old ass at the Long Island National Cemetery to lie with my fellow veterans and countrymen - with my father and mother. I never thought she'd be doing surgery like this as a young girl of only 66 years of age.

I never gave a rat's ass about brawling stage 3 lung cancer for two years before having some lung chopped out of me. And I didn't particularly care with what the Marine Corps did with me when I was a teenager more than half a century ago.

But I do care about Colleen. She's too good to lose and I want her to bury me.

Say a prayer for her if you can. Thanks.

Colleen is in my prayers.

And mine...
updates

Monday's surgery was a success and now it's just a matter of recovery and rehab. I'm hoping Colleen can be home this weekend. The post-op miseries are not pleasant to see.